One "old-wives tale" with unknown validity: if you do need to move away from a bear, and when there's a choice, move downhill. Bears supposedly have much stronger hind legs than front ones, and it's claimed they can't run downhill as fast as they can going up. You can probably run downhill faster than you can run up. (Even with the purported advantage, they can probably outrun you.)

I'm not sure I'd want to go challenge a bear to a footrace to see if it's true; but if you're gonna be discussing bears with people who might know, you might ask about this theory.

John