A Sarasota County deputy turned a shoplifting call into something out of a track meet, and it’s catching attention across the community.. It happened near Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Way and Pershing Avenue. The Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office Facebook post of the race has gone viral with over 1,000 reactions and 125 shares.

Footage from the scene shows a crowd of people gathering after deputies responded to a shoplifting report Tuesday night. 

A man in the crowd, identified as Jacoby Jacobs, looked at deputies and made a bold claim: “If it were me, you wouldn’t catch me.”  One deputy took him up on the challenge.

With the crowd cheering and a clear lane ahead, the two raced. And yes, the deputy won.