I had a great track workout today. I had not done one since 2004. I did a set of:
1 mile warm-up at 10.10,
800 at 3.46,
1 mile at 7.48,
800 m at 3.56,
followed by a 1 mile cool down run.

The story however, does not relate to my run which, by the way, was terrific. I was running with my buddy, when I noticed two ladies walking ahead of us. I yelled "track", but they did not budge.I asked politely, "Ma'am, could you please move to that track" {pointing to the track closest to the fence}. No response. As I passed them, I pointed to the track and made a "move there, please" gesture.

We carried on. Soon we encountered them again, and the same story was repeated. When the 800 m run was completed, they passed us. I walked up to the ladies and informed them politely where they ought to do their walking. One lady gently said, " We typically walk on different numbers after every round." The other one looked at me sternly and said: "We'll walk where we WANT to!".

Taken aback, I told her, "No ma'am. There are rules for running/walking on the track. You must not walk on the middle tracks when runners are out there." She ignored me and continued walking.

Now, these two ladies were immigrants (probably from mainland China) and perhaps, my Indian accented English confused them! However, I was aghast that one of the ladies was rude inspite of my polite request. The other lady was quite accommodative.

It is quite disappointing to see many people use the tracks as paths for walking. While we do track workouts, we are targeting a particular pace. Sometimes, runners are zoned out and are not aware of a walker until the last moment. Therefore, it is not only distracting, but quite hazardous to walk on the tracks. Some runners do their warm up runs anti-clockwise in lane 2 or 3! I do realise that not everyone is aware of track etiquette. But, when someone tries to inform you of it, you ought to listen.

See these links 1, 2, 3, that contain info on track etiquette.