There are people who say they are dying to ride on RAGBRAI. Greg Schraeder of Omaha actually died training for one — at least for a while.
“I was clinically dead for about 12 1/2 minutes,” said Schraeder, 65, who suffered the cardiac arrest that almost claimed his life on June 20, 2023, following a ride with friends ahead of that year’s 50th anniversary ride.
It might not seem like it, but Schraeder, who eventually had triple bypass surgery, was extremely lucky that day.
When his heart stopped, he was surrounded by what he called his “dream team,” friends Dr. Phil Meyer, a retired pediatrician, Dave Martens, a retired law enforcement officer, and Lisa Nelson.
Though he has no memory of that day, those who were there to help save his life after he collapsed have since filled him in on what he missed.
“Dr. Phil said that when he turned me over, I was as blue as a Smurf,” Schraeder said.
That’s when Nelson, who he calls his “guardian angel,” jumped in “barking orders and beginning CPR” and Martens administered mouth-to-mouth resuscitation until EMTs arrived.
The next thing Schraeder remembers is waking up in the emergency room and telling a nurse about being hit earlier by a deer while riding his bike.
“It was like I was speaking in tongues she was so surprised. I guess nobody comes to so soon after cardiac arrest,” said Schraeder, who is retired after a 25-year career in the Air Force. “Usually people are in a coma for a couple of days,”
His luck didn’t end there.
“People who suffer cardiac arrest only have about a 2 to 3% chance of living and only about 1% chance of getting all their memory back,” he said. “My memory should have been wiped. I mean, I was clinically dead.”
He said his visitors in the hospital included two of the emergency room nurses who had attended him when he first arrived.
“They didn’t come in to see me. They came in to see someone who had actually survived what I went through,” he said.
Back on the road in two months, he’s ready for RAGBRAI
He recalled that he had done 60- and 70-mile rides a few days earlier to prepare for RAGBRAI 2023 and that he was fortunate to have not suffered cardiac arrest then.
“I wouldn’t be here if I had,” he said.
Schraeder said he did not have an after-life experience while clinically dead. His wife Debbie, however, believes there was divine intervention.
“My brother had died on June 20th a few years earlier and my mom would not have been able to take losing both her boys on the same day,” Schraeder said. “Debbie thinks it was my brother pushing back.”
And while some people would have put their bike on Craigslist after such an experience, he was eager to get back on the road.
“Doctors told me after the surgery it would probably be six months before I was able to get back on a bike,” said Schraeder who took up cycling during the COVID-19 pandemic. “I did the math. That would have taken it into December, which just didn’t work.”
Instead, he said he was riding again in two months, working his way up from 3- and 4-mile excursions.
He said the experience changed him “mentally, physically and spiritually.”
“I don’t hold onto things anymore that upset me. I move on. I don’t let little stuff bother me. And I tell my kids, don’t waste a minute,” he said. “You never know when you could just be gone.”
Schraeder rode the 420 miles of the Bicycle Ride Across Nebraska almost exactly a year after his cardiac arrest and rode two days of RAGBRAI in 2024.
Aboard for the entire RAGBRAI 52, he got a bit of a surprise when a young man whose gave his name as Kyle approached him to say he was in the operating room as a medical technician during his open-heart surgery.
“Kyle told me it was a miracle I was alive, let alone riding on RAGBRAI,” he said.
He definitely hasn’t forgotten his dream team and the other medical professionals who saved his life.
The cap on his handlebar post serves as a reminder of those who came to his aid, with the message, “I’m not dead yet, June 20, 2023.”
Kevin Baskins covers jobs and the economy for the Des Moines Register. Reach him at kbaskins@registermedia.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: He died — at least for a while — getting ready for RAGBRAI. Now he’s back for the full ride
Reporting by Kevin Baskins, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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