To stop. Or not to Stop?

Mick, I agree with you on this. Us older more rational humans have the ability to place things in the correct order as befits a civilised society. We just have to accept that there are socipaths out there who put their ambition and themselves so far beyond anything and anyone else it is hardly surprising they hate stopping for anything, no matter what. 

Stevie G . wrote (see)

It's all well and good saying you'd always stop on a training run.

But really?

Would you stop a furious tempo run just because some chump is asking you the way to Tesco? Or only for emergencies?

Or do you just stop for anyone or thing on the off chance it's serious?

No, I just stop because they're asking a question.  It's never all that serious, but it's something important enough to them that they've stopped a stranger to ask for help.  They usually apologise for stopping me. 

Lots of potentially fast training runs get interrupted by having to slow down for horses on the path, but I could avoid that with a different route.  Most riders are fine, but there's a few who are among the most inconsiderate people on the planet.  I guess some think the same of cyclists though.

I can't believe people would see someone collapsing right in front of them and not stop. PB or not, 100 yards from the finish or not, winning the bloody race outright or not, FFS how could anyone just run past someone in trouble?

Different if you see someone who obviously got into trouble a while ago and is already being attended to by marshals and/or paramedics - there's most likely nothing more to help you could do. But if someone in the same race as me, just a few yards ahead of me, crumpled right in front of me? I'd likely want to stay with them till the ambulance arrived. It might sound corny to the ruthless PB hunters, but when I'm running, I feel a sense of kinship with the other people running round about me. I wouldn't run past anyone who was potentially in trouble without stopping first to check that they were okay.

The UTMB has a rule that requires all competitors to give assistance to other runners who might require it in an emergency. Even to the point of a runner having to abandon their own race and backtrack to the last checkpoint. Failure to comply with this rule is an automatic DQ. When I'm running, I have a kind of personal rule like that for myself.

And yes, I also stop for chumps looking for Tesco, annoying dimwits hillwalking without maps, people who want directions even when I have no knowledge of the locale, kids and little old ladies walking their dogs who just want to say hello. If I had to pick between the two, I'd rather be a nice person than a better runner.

Nice person or better runner, which do you see Jimmy Saville as? Seem's he didn't stop...