moogleattack
Darwin award recipient
On the site that I posted earlier it said:
"Miyamoto was questioned about the running man: "The running man has no significance in the game, he is mainly to train you to move around faster" "However, there is something you can do while racing, which can change something in the game. It is not much, but it is very rewarding. I am not sure if our friends overseas have found this out yet, but definitely I have known about Japanese players finding this extra secret. I am not sure why many people have not found it yet, because it is a simple thing to find out"
So is there really something to the running man, besides just using him to train to run faster? I haven't a clue, but I will definitely recommend some people to look more carefully into the game. Don't take this as a rumor, because Miyamoto himself said it (or the translator screwed up, but hopefully he didn't)."
That makes me think that even if you can't beat him something might happen.