Craziest thing to ever happen to you while running?

mrg wrote:

I was running in the dark with a headlamp on. Got a sense that something was running along side so, I looked down with the headlamp and found a skunk pacing along side me. I then ran what seemed like a 5 flat 100 to lose it....Another time, I was on a trail looking down watching for snakes when a wild turkey flew or jumped straight up in front of me. I could feel the wind from it's wings beating trying to get away from me. I don't know who was scared more, the turkey or me at that moment...........

I was running in Oklahoma once with my sister when we went camping. We were enjoying the pleasant scenery when all of the sudden we see a tarantula in the middle of the road. We stop for a second because she wants to get a closer look at it. While she's busy studying the spider, I look up and see a massive bison standing about six feet away from us in the ditch. I think I was more scared of the bison charging us than the spider. Nonetheless, we got back to the rest of our run unscathed.

A couple of years ago, I helped a drunk guy carry his drunk wife back to their house. I guess she had passed out on the sidewalk while they were walking home from the local bar. The guy flagged me down as I ran by on my evening 9 miler and I helped the dude carry his wife back to the front porch of their house just down the block.

I found something like $7 in change in one spot in the road one time. It was bizarre.

I hesitate to write this one, becuase it is so far-fetched. But let me assure you, it all happened.

It was almost 25 years ago, when I went to college in far northern California at the edge of a huge national forest. I was running up an old disused logging road with my roommate when I smelled something terrible. There's this crashing sound just up ahead and this huge hairy beast bursts from the woods. He was at least eight feet tall. He looked at my buddy and me for second and then took off up the road twice as fast as we could run. We followed his footprints for a few hundred yards until they turned off down a steep ravine.

We kept on our run, but when we turned around we kept wondering if he was going to be waiting for us with a couple of his buddies. We decided to stop at this huge blackberry patch and pick a bunch of berries as a peace offering, just in case. Well, when we didn't see them we felt pretty foolish, so we left the berries at the place where Bigfoot had first come out of the woods. I still have the stained T-shirt as proof.

But here's the really crazy thing: That night, we heard these eerie howls up the hill from our apartment. It took me a long time to fall asleep, but suddenly it was a bright sunny morning and my roommate is yelling "hey, come look at this!" There were three dead squirrels, their necks broken, lined up neatly on our kitchen table just inside an open window that Bigfoot had pried open.

Well, what could we do but eat them? I mean, it's not every day Bigfoot gives you squirrels. (I broke 25 on a tough 8K course the following Saturday, maybe my best cross country race ever.) The next time we ran that road, a couple weeks later, we brought along a bunch of nuts and granola from the co-op and left it at the same place. Sure enough, a couple of rabbits this time.

I never saw Bigfoot again, but I know he was out there, watching over me. About three months later, in the heart of the winter rainy season, I slipped and fell down that same ravine. I tumbled into a torrent of icy cold water that was raging down the ravine. I tried over and over to grab hold of a branch or a rock, but I was getting numb and ready to give up. Just as things were going black, I felt a powerful hand reach down below the murky depths and yank me out of the water. When I woke up I was laid out on a rock high above the water, covered in pine branches to keep me warm.

I was making a left-hand turn on my favorite route when 'lo and behold 4 or 5 (I forget exactly) little skunks came skuttling out of the brush to cross the street DIRECTLY in front of me.

Right after them was either Mom or Dad who set eyes upon me.

I froze dead in my tracks and actually said "Go on...you have the right of way" and waved it toward the little ones.

The parent followed them, then turned and looked back at me, after which it headed into the brush on the other side of the road after them.

Funniest thing that ever happened to me running.

..........and then I woke up and had some breakfast

$$$$$$ wrote:

I found something like $7 in change in one spot in the road one time. It was bizarre.

were you wearing a black fedora, black slacks, white shirt and black tie?

Elwood: Jake, there's gotta be at least seven dollars worth of change here!

One late August in MA I was doing my usual trail run for that day. As I was running down one particular trail, something flew overhead. When I looked up, I thought "Cool, an owl". Boy, was I wrong. The damn thing kept dive-bombing my head. I stopped and stared him down (which you actually shouldn't do because they see it as a threat and will claw your guys out). I finally picked up a stick and backed out of the trail. He left me alone once I reached the trailhead. Needless to say, I went home and never returned to that trail again. Now, I live in Texas so I am waiting for some hillbilly to do something stupid :)

I did get shot in the head once (by some sort of BB gun), but that was when I was on a bike.

For a good Bigfoot story:

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=1344701&page=0

No I wasn't. The final chase scene in that movie is an all-time classic.

Just how many police cruisers were wrecked in total?

delila wrote:

One late August in MA I was doing my usual trail run for that day. As I was running down one particular trail, something flew overhead. When I looked up, I thought "Cool, an owl". Boy, was I wrong. The damn thing kept dive-bombing my head. I stopped and stared him down (which you actually shouldn't do because they see it as a threat and will claw your guys out). I finally picked up a stick and backed out of the trail. He left me alone once I reached the trailhead. Needless to say, I went home and never returned to that trail again. Now, I live in Texas so I am waiting for some hillbilly to do something stupid :)

Same thing happened to me, except is was a considerably smaller bird. And it was on a road I ran on daily. So after the third day of attacks, I brought a tennis racket. After receiving a well-timed slice that sent it reeling into the grass, the bird flew away never to attack again.

Funny how there are so many weird things that have happened in the woods...

I have a long and funny story...but in sum my CC buddies and I ran into a naked kid in the woods playing Lord of the Flies...it was in Manitowoc, WI in 1986....he started throwing rocks at us and we corned and jumped him - my buddy said to him - "You speak english?"...the kid says yes and that we was naked for an all over body tan because girls love it!

I ran over a deer.

I was coming around a turn in an area of the woods where the vegetation was thick and the trail was rough enough that I had to keep my eyes on it. All of the sudden, my feet are up in the air and I flip over to fall on my back. I look back to see what happened, and I had broadsided a buck who was standing across the middle of the trail.

The buck turns to stare at me with disdain, and then hops away into the forest.

We corned and jumped him.. Is that code for something?

I was running alongside a corn field and out stepped Dick Cheney with a 12 gauge and an Elmer Fudd hat. He started running with me, with the barrel pointed at me screaming: "You gotta problem with Bud Ice? Huh, bitch?"

Scary.

Darryl Dorkman wrote:

For me, it was when my college teammates and I got lost in the woods and ended up accidentally trespassing on some hick's property. He chased us down the dirt road in a pickup truck, stopped next to us, and jumped out with a rifle, no shoes and a wife-beater. He never pointed the gun at us, but during his angry tirade I was sure we were dead men. He yelled, "didn't ya see my signs posted?"

Same thing happened to me in Sewanee, TN in about 1984. I think the guy thought we were coming to take away his dope--it was October.

In one 5K, the motorcyclist that was leading the race completely skipped a loop through a neighborhood, cutting the 5K down to about a 4.25K. The first of the pack were coming in, everyone EXTREMELY excited about their times, until they found out it was a short course. Bum-mer!

A few years ago, a friend and I decided to explore some trails on Tiger Mountain in WA. We started running up one, and it got pretty steep, so we kindof walked/climbed/hiked up this little twisty trail.

As we get farther up this trail, stuff gets weirder and weirder.

Started off with some beer bottles, and maybe some needles, but we had seen similar stuff before, so this was no biggie.

About half way up the trail, we see a dead racoon or some other similar animal in a plastic grocery bag. Why we kept going up this trail was beyond me, looking back. Stupid stuff you do in HS.

Anyway, when we got to the top/end of this little switchback, we got to a little clearing with a tent, a big cross in the ground, like human sized, ropes tied around it, and a bunch of little crucifixes sitting on the arms of the cross.

We stood there kinda freaked out for a bit, and then we smelled cigarette smoke, figured someone was fairly close, and ran like hell away from there.

So in summary, beer, needles, dead animal in bag, crucifix, and cigarette smoke = weirdest thing i have ever seen on a run.