I hit a car today while running

Yes, you read that right. I hit a car. The car did not hit me.

I was running this morning on the edge of the road against the flow of traffic. A burnt orange Dodge Neon was coming at a pretty good clip down a residential street. The driver was not relinquishing the side of the road to me even though it was a two lane road and there were no cars coming from behind me.

I stood my ground and was not going to give in to the car. At the end I stepped off the side of the road and readied myself to whack the side of the car as it drove by.

A word about proper car whacking technique: You have to be smart in your timing of these things. You don’t want to hit between the doors and hit one of the real solid parts of the car. You also don’t want to hit the front of the car just in case you don’t pull your hand back fast enough to clear the mirror. I also choose not to whack the door itself. Those can be more expensive to repair than the back quarter panel. I am just kind that way.

As the car pulled near I side stepped and gave it a good solid whack. I felt the quarter panel bend in real good, but then it sounded like it popped right back out as the car went by. Too bad.

I then readied myself for the repercussions of the driver turning around and coming after me. I was hoping to finish my lap of speed work before having to deal with the driver. But, the driver never came after me. I heard the car slow down, but then drive right off.

This happens on occasion, but never have I had someone driving so fast directly at me. Usually they are going slower and feel that they can risk getting close to me without really hitting me. I have also never hit a car as hard as I hit this one. I was a bit angry to say the least. I just hit another car last week in the same neighborhood, but not near as hard.

Here is the absolutely scary part about this incident this morning. After it was all said and done, I started putting pieces together. It was a female driver. Female drivers don’t play chicken with runners. They are much more thoughtful than that. I have only ever had problems with male bus, taxi and car drivers. Never a female. What I realized when it was over was this: she never saw me. Had I been running with the flow of traffic and assumed that any car coming up behind me would go around, I probably would still be in a hospital at this time. She was going fast enough to have either killed me or seriously damaged my body.