cougar fatalities are extremely rare, still, like perhaps 1-2 a year across both the US and Canada. I don't mean to trivialize it but there are 20-30 people killed by [pet] dog attacks a year, with many more harmed. Yet we rarely think about the risk of that, and amplify our perceived risk of wild animal attack. Kind of like bike vs car risk stats. We get a few bear-in-the-backyard scenarios around this area every year and frequently the bear is killed by cops (sometimes AC officers), even if it hasn't attacked anything.

I'm sure the cyclist was still terrified as I think we all would be in that situation, and he is lucky that cat missed his wheel...

I "feel" like I saw a cougar when my husband and I were cycling in BC on a back road along a mountain valley with farms two years ago; it was an animal with a long large tail in a field, which bounded like a cat, but it was on the opposite side of a field quite far away. I will never know for sure but even it did give me a lot of pause, and if it was something else, I'd love to know what...