What's it with some people?

I was on an easy pace with Gan yesterday - the weather had been hot and humid, a contrast from the previous week. In the middle of the 1st lap, I spotted this regular fella doing some stretching. Before long, and as expected, he passed the 2 of us. This fella is not tall and runs with a stiff upper body and arms. Only the legs will hop along lightly. In fact his turnover is very good and he's a good runner. I estimate him regularly averaging 6:30 laps.

After he passed us he kept a gap of 150m in front. After Gan completed his workout, I ran easily alone. Then I noticed that this fella slowed down considerably as if allowing me to catch up. As I was running very easily at my own pace, I just ambled along. Then he slowed down even more. It was to be another lap before I passed him. True to my suspicion he immediately picked up his pace again and overtook me. Naturally I was couldn't care less about it but what irked me was that he kept peering over his shoulder to see where I was.

There's a reason why a training run is called as such. Leave the intimidation or arrogance elsewhere - it has no place in distance running. If he wanted to run fast or slow, it's entirely up to him. Doing fast times and overtaking is best left at the races when it matters! In which case I outran him the recent Sunday. And so did Ronnie, to whom he dished out the same behaviour last week.

I have a message to this person, if he's reading the blog: "Lighten Up!"