Okay, this is the follow up to Kris’s fight. A few of you asked about him wrestling a guy with a mower. That is true, but the story starts much earlier.
One day I was mowing the back yard and Kris came back from a ride and his jersey was all ripped up. It turned out that Kris got into a tangle with some redneck in a pickup. The truck stopped and Kris realized it was going to get sort of ugly He took off his cycling shoes in front of the neighbor’s architectural business.
Pretty soon they were at it, I’m not sure who was winning by the time the guys from the office came out and broke it up, saying they were going to call the police. Like I said above, Kris’s jersey was ripped and he said one of his back teeth was chipped.
Flash forward over a month, we are driving through Westboro, a nice neighborhood in Topeka, throwing newspapers and Kris tells me to stop the car. I stop the car and Kris gets out and starts running back towards a huge house with a guy mowing. I thought I was hallucinating, but before I could blink, Kris had tackled this dude and was mildly pummeling him. The guy had no idea what hit him. Anyway, after about 15 seconds, it was all over. Kris got up, said something to the guy and came back to the car.
I had no idea what I had just witnessed. It was like when I had a cat that jumped over a bush, ran across the yard and jumped on the back of a German Sheppard, who was on a leash. Kris goes on to explain that the lawn mowing guy was the pickup truck driver from the previous month. He said that he said something like “Don’t mess with cyclists.” I’m pretty sure that wasn’t the best way to get his point across. And I doubt it worked too well.
Anyway, it isn’t like Kris is beating up every driver giving him shit. These are the only two instances that went beyond words. But, you have to remember, it was the days when the fighting was just fighting and the worst that was going to come of it was getting hit really hard in the face. Those days are long gone.
Perhaps we need to hire “enforcers”, like hockey goons, to beat up on people who harass or attack cyclists. They could ride around bike towns like Boulder or Portland and respond to incidents by beating the crap out of those miscreants. Maybe Kris could get this started.
Love these stories. Can you post some pictures of you and Kris together from back around this time period? Really want to see those clogs!
…ahh, the good old days, when a fist-fight ended with the winner buying the loser a beer.
…and pity the fool who would start anything with the two of you after that.
I was laughing so hard I could not even read, for some reason I can picture this clearly in my head like I was there!
These days the loser just comes back and shoots you, shoots up your house, or runs you over the next time they see you riding. Worse yet, the loser tells all their homies to run over ANY cyclist they see. Hence the reason I kept road riding to an absolute minumum required the last couple years there.
Yeah, I had a few near run-ins on the Farmer’s Turnpike many years ago, though being a scrawny beanpole who grew up on Fred Rogers, fighting wasn’t my first choice. Honestly being run over or hit, as has happened to some messengers (among others), is a very real and unfortunate consequence of vehicle-cyclist relations. Not to mention the guns, baseball bats, and whatever else.
Steve, I remember doing a ride with you, Kris, Gilbert and the late ’90s crew wherein you chased down a pickup truck driver and he brandished a firearm. Glad that one was over before it had a chance to go anywhere.
What us Kris up to these days? Haven’t seen him at any of the cross races this year… not that I’ve been to a ton of them myself.
Two fat fucks shot an off-duty sheriff cycling in Fresno a couple of weeks ago. “Only” a pellet gun but was lodged close to his spine so docs left it there.
And I have to pay for their incarceration through taxes? That’s not right.