Picture the scene....
The Military Road on the southern edge of the IoW, yours truly halfway round a 'round the island', on his mudguarded triple equipped fast tourer, spinning in the middle ring in jolly day ride mode.
A roadie approaches from behind and draws alongside, we exchange pleasantries, he sounds local, we chat for a few seconds, and off he goes. As the gap between us opens he looks over his shoulder repeatedly with no change of position of turn forthcoming. Across the undulating countryside we ride and soon he is a tiny figure in the distance. for reaosns beyond me I slip into the big ring on the next downslope and stay in it. Slowly, slowy the figure in front grows larger, he looks again and sees I've cut the distance by half, stands on his pedals on the climb. I reach the next upslope some seconds behind and dig in, down on the drops, teeth gritted.
Now I'm close enough to see what gears he is pulling on the climbs, lower than mine, so I tough it out closing all the time and finding the going somewhat easier than he seems to be but now I have a crisis of etiquette so I decide to tail him rather than going past. I don't draught, staying about 10m back, although at times I have to back off to avoid sucking his wheel. A few km later he turns off and I call a goodbye, which seemed to make him jump, and go through Chale for the monster climb up Blythe Shute and beyond past Blackgang
Should I have just gone past him or is that seen as throwing down a gauntlet....?
If it keeps on happening then I say, see you later whenever I pass the DF.
