Around 11 p.m. last Thursday night, Tay Anthony was heading home to Brooklyn after a pool training session when he noticed a drunk man attacking a passenger unprovoked.
“My first thought was disbelief in what was going on,” he told Runner’s World. “My second thought was how can I intervene?”
The 27-year-old triathlete is fairly new to the sport, and he has been putting in a lot of work in the water to get better at swimming for competition. Leaving his workout, he happened to be in the right place at the right time. Once he saw the man punch the passenger in the face, he sprung into action, jumping up to tackle and stop the attacker with the help of another passenger. At the next stop, they threw the culprit off the train “Spiderman style,” said Mike Kolb, the passenger who was assaulted.
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Kolb, a singer-songwriter who was commuting home from his serving job, had been sitting with a colleague when it happened. “It’s not like he came up and hit me many times,” he told Runner’s World, “He just came up and like, punched me on the side of my head the one time.”
Kolb’s coworker ran to the next train car and banged on the conductor’s door trying to get help, but no authorities intervened, and it was ultimately thanks to the help of Anthony and another stranger that the situation was resolved.
Anthony, who is the lead service technician at a full-service bike shop in New York City, says he has been involved in situations like this before, so he wasn’t scared, but he was hoping the assailant didn’t have a concealed weapon.
“We had to justify our actions to other passengers,” Anthony said, “They were confused as to why we had to subdue somebody and remove them from the car because without context, it definitely looked chaotic.”
The two did not file a police report, but after the kerfuffle, they found the attacker’s driver’s license on the floor of the train car—the man was a 6’3” 29-year-old Poughkeepsie resident.
The bystander effect can have real consequences for people’s lives, and Kolb and Anthony both walked away from the incident with a renewed sense of community.
Anthony said the situation was a reminder “to not only stay vigilant but [be] available to help others.” He noticed that several people ran away when things heated up, but “I have been in a situation where I needed help, so I couldn’t sit by and watch. What if it was me? I hope other people can put themselves in others’ shoes and practice more empathy.”
In an Instagram story Kolb posted that night, over an adrenaline-fueled selfie he took of himself with Anthony, he wrote: “This could have gone down so many ways but seeing people protect and take care of each other, condemning violence, left me inspired that we have hope for humanity ... Let’s all take care of each other.”
Abby Carney is a writer and journalist in New York. A former D1 college runner and current amateur track athlete, she's written about culture and characters in running and outdoor sports for Runner's World, Like the Wind Magazine, The New York Times, and other outlets. She also writes about things that have nothing to do with running, and was previously the editor of a food magazine.
