Mo Farah lifts lid on park brawl with stranger

London: Double world and Olympic champion Mo Farah has revealed that he once became embroiled in a fist-fight with a stranger while training in a park in London.

The Somalia-born Briton, champion over 5,000 metres and 10,000 metres at both last year`s London Olympics and this year`s World Championships, made the revelation in his new autobiography, which is being serialised in British newspaper the Daily Telegraph. Farah said that the incident happened on Christmas Day in 2009 after he asked a couple with a pram not to block a path in Richmond Park in southwest London. "All of a sudden the man stepped towards me, as if he wanted to fight," Farah said. "He was much taller and bigger than me, but I did not want to back down. We were in each other`s faces. Then it all kicked off. "Before I knew it, we were having a full-blown fight, rolling around on the ground, trading blows. Onlookers had to pull us apart before things got really bad." The usually mild-mannered Farah subsequently called his wife, Tania, who drove to the park to collect him. The police also arrived, but Farah said that although there were "nicks and cuts" all over his face and a "massive bruise" on his head, they were reluctant to pursue the matter. "The other guy looked the worse for wear too, and although I told the police that he had attacked me first, they were reluctant to press charges because the guy looked as if he had come off worse in the scrap," he said. "I came home, cleaned up and changed and forgot about it. But it`s fair to say my Christmas Day got off to a bad start."