Sarah Cooper wasn't sure she wanted to ride a bike ever again.
At the time she was a college student recovering in a hospital after being sideswiped by a car traveling 45 mph while she was navigating a crosswalk on her bike.
“I’m lucky to be alive,” the nation’s best female ultracyclist told a gathering at the Capital Striders’ Annual Dinner at the West Des Moines Marriott on Friday night.
The Urbandale resident doesn’t know how she escaped with a few broken bones and permanent hearing loss in one ear. “My injuries were pretty minor,” she said.
The fear of being hit by a car lingered long after her injuries healed.