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Three weeks earlier, the eighth-grade student from Cadott began choking on a cheese curd at The District Pub & Grill in downtown Eau Claire. Dykes was sitting just feet away enjoying a bowl of chili when head baseball coach Patrick Reilly alerted him to the escalating situation.

“I’m like, oh boy, that looks bad,” recalls Dykes. “It seemingly felt like he was starting to go unconscious.”

Dykes, who has 25 years of experience in fire service and instruction, quickly assessed the situation and began to deliver a series of back blows. He made sure 911 was notified and prepared to start CPR on Gulich, until he felt something.

“A little tiny movement of air, and I said, ‘ooh, that sounds like something.’ So, I hit him again,” Dykes says. “He got just enough air movement that he reached into his mouth and pulled out what can only be described as an ungodly amount of cheese.”

Gulich says the event was mostly a blur. His mother, Karen Winchell, says she performed the Heimlich maneuver until Dykes took over.

“It’s not something you really want to do, but when it comes to CPR, that’s definitely not something that you want to perform on your own child,” says Winchell, an experienced healthcare professional.

The restaurant was silent as Gulich caught his breath, but the teenager and Dykes soon sat down at their respective tables to finish their meals.

“I had little tears in my eyes because you’re amped up,” Dykes says.

He was also emotional because his son Cooper, a college junior home on winter break, witnessed the entire event.

“To see the pride in my son’s eyes, in that moment, I was a cool dad,” says Dykes, a father of three children.

The day ended without names or contact information being shared, so Winchell relied on The District’s staff to identify Dykes. Tuesday, everyone was thankful for the chance to meet under better circumstances.

“It was nice to find out who he was and find out more about his background,” Winchell says.

Over the last 25 years, Dykes has served as a firefighter and medic for the Eau Claire Fire Department and Chippewa Fire District and as a fire instructor for Chippewa Valley Technical College. He is the president and founder of Northern Star Fire and holds multiple patents on innovative safety devices.

All that experience has taught Dykes to celebrate the ‘wins’ of happy endings, but to also recognize those who do not receive recognition.

“Those first responders, doctors, nurses, teachers, instructors and so on. This is for them,” Dykes says.

Gulich took a course on CPR and first aid with his mother a few years ago and encourages everyone to do the same.

“In case something like this happens again,” he says. “At least someone knows what’s going on and can help a little bit.”