‘When I'm riding I just feel really alive’
On March 25, 2014 it is no understatement to say that Vanessa Ruck’s life changed forever.
She collided with a red light-jumping car while on her bicycle, shattering her right shoulder and right hip in the process. This led to reconstructive surgery and seven operations in as many years.
It was while on her long road to recovery that this adrenaline-loving woman decided to take up off-road motorbike riding, and so The Girl on a Bike was born.
Now Vanessa, an international business studies graduate of the University of Portsmouth, uses her experiences to help inspire and empower her 260,000 followers on social media, in schools and through keynote speaking.
Through her various channels – including Facebook, YouTube and TikTok – she updates her followers on all her exploits, taking the rough with the smooth.
Last month this included being the first woman to enter, and then complete the gruelling eight-stage Tunisia Desert Challenge – but not without another life-threatening incident.
During the fourth stage, her bike malfunctioned at about 10.30am, and at first Vanessa, 35, was fine.
‘I was pretty chilled out. It was almost peaceful – I was sat in the dunes, I could randomly see and hear other competitors in the distance and there were quite a few vehicles going through.
‘The organisation really is incredible. I can't emphasise enough how good the organisation is far as safety. There's no need to die of heat and dehydration – we have the emergency systems in place. The organisers were spot on.’
Another vehicle stopped and helped her prop the bike up and use a cape to create a bit of shade for her while waiting for sweeper truck at the back of the race to collect her.
Even with nine 1.5l bottles of water and keeping her skin covered from the sun, with the temperature reaching 45 centigrade, as Vanessa says: ‘The body can't handle that heat and intensity for that long.
‘It was when the wind picked up to the point that I couldn't breathe that I was getting panic attacks. My headache was building and there was so much sand.
‘I lay in the foetal position in my little patch of shade and I wrapped this scarf double to make a little air pocket I could breathe in.’ The winds had picked up to 50mph. ‘Through my accident recovery I've discovered a lot of mindfulness, and it's one of the ways I manage the chronic ongoing pain I have with my hip. ‘Mindfulness has made me more able and more aware to be in control of my conscious thoughts, which leads your subconscious and your emo
‘Now I feel like I've taken back control’
tions.’
But the panic attacks kept coming, with Vanessa eventually realising she needed to press the help button on her bike. The helicopter came within half an hour, but then disappeared.
‘That's when I had the worst panic attack I've had in my life – I couldn't breathe, my heart rate was racing.’
They had, however, landed about 500m away, the nearest safe spot they could find. Several minutes later a medic arrived and ‘had to pretty much drag me through the dunes.’
Back at the camp she had three bags of fluid put in her by IV drip.
While full of praise for the medics, Vanessa suffered nightmares that night and was initially adamant she was going to retire from the race. She was forced to rest the next day while her bike was recovered, but the day after: ‘I woke up in the morning and was like, where's my bike? And back off into the desert I went.
‘Until that my day my accident recovery was the hardest thing I've ever been through, and now I feel like I've taken back control. Now the hardest thing I've ever done is something I chose, and there's something really empowering about that.’
While Vanessa began riding about six years ago, the endurance, rally side is a more recent addition – she tackled her first, Valleys Xtreme in the Welsh valleys in January 2020.
‘That was the start of this whole: "Hm, I quite enjoy this disgusting painful race scenario...”’ she says with a laugh.
‘Before my husband and I had even made it home from that race, we'd come up with the idea to enter Red Bull Romainiacs,’ a race series in Romania.
From there it was the Dakar Rally, her first desert race.
‘Psychologically, when I try and break it down, in those race conditions, there is no capacity for anything else.
‘Sat here right now, I can feel my hip pain, it's there, I live with it.
‘There’s a 95 per cent certainty that I'm going to need more surgery, but I can't just sit on the sofa. That would be worse for my mental health, if I didn't get out there and try to make the most of every day.
‘But when I'm riding I just feel really alive and in my element.’
Now living in Wye Valley, near Monmouth, Vanessa has been doing Girl on a Bike fulltime for two-and-a-half years – quitting her career in communications and marketing.
‘It wasn't about money, a massive part of it was mental health. I had about 45,000 followers when I quit my job, and my first month I earned £100. It wasn't about that – I needed time to process, and for rehab, my hospital appointments.
‘If you told me six years ago when I started Girl on a Bike that I'd be doing it full-time, I would have choked on my drink – I wouldn't have believed it.
‘But as I've shared my story and started to be more and more open, it makes you pretty vulnerable when you share everything, but I never realised it would help so many people. And somehow helping them helps me, and it's got this lovely energy of trying to give something good to the world. ‘I've never worked as much as I do now, but it's incredibly rewarding.’
For more information and links to her social media, go to thegirlonabike.com.
‘I never realised it would help so many people’