Wondered if you guys who take your dogs out for a ride have any wisdom/advice. Situation is I love taking my dog Holly for rides with me, however she only has one speed (supersonic sound barrier-breaking fast) and this causes her to rip open her pads after about 30 mins, which then takes about two weeks to heal fully. I recently tried wrapping her pads in a thin bandage lately but she shredded this off after 100 yards, any pearls of wisdom (short of getting her shoed like a horse)

here she is in action ripping up a hill!

You could try some of the protective shoes the police and fire dogs wear but high speed grip may be a problem. I’m sure there used to be a brand of dog shoes called Reebark.

she needs to Dog the F Up.

Doggie boots it is
Google for them you get loads including hi traction socks

Ruffwear seem to get good reviews. I have never tried using them tho’.

See them on Ebay a fair bit.

The problem you’ll have running the dog with boots is that dogs feet overheat an awful lot whilst running, that’s why they’ll take every opportunity for a paddle in streams and puddles etc.

lol @ wwaswas – I thought that too, I told my OH that if i kept at it her feet would toughen up, but after a year or so, still no dice!

On a related note, what are whippets like as riding dogs? Are they good at staying close, coming back when called and all that?

what are whippets like as riding dogs?

They’re not too bad if you have short legs 😀

@jota180 *applauds*

Get her a bike.

@jota LOL
Have only ever ridden with Holly so dont have much to compare to, but she is fantastic as a running dog, she stays fairly close – until she spies a rabbit or grouse and gives chase always comes back when called though. As I mentioned earlier, main problem is speed she gives it 110% all the time, so lots of water and swimming breaks for her to keep coll and hydrated.

jota – chapeau monsieur, chapeau 🙂

Hey good work dude! I used to ride with our two whippets, they are unreal. No matter how fast you go, they can always go faster, even full pelt downhill

Had a similar problem with our female whippets pads. Also her chest would get all scuffed from bombing over rough stuff, she’d catch her tail on things, flip over and scrape her head etc. Our male seemed a lot sturdier, he had courser fur and tougher pads

In the end I stopped taking them as they would just get carried away chasing squirrels, rabbits, deer, alpacas (no joke), cows etc. As there were two of them they would get the pack instinct thing and would not give up or come back until they had either caught something or it was well and truly out of sight.

Sorry no useful advice, but fond memories and good to see someone who manages to ride with their whippet

@wilko, yeah really is great to ride with and as you say, no matter how fast I go I cannot touch her, even full pelt in big ring/big ring downhill cannot get close!

We have a a collie whippet cross and she has currently been clocked at 27mph by my garmin. Paws are normally in good shape unless she skids around a lot. She hasn’t ever cut a pad but has had a few slices and nicks. We do a lot of beach walking and running with her as well, so I’m wondering if the sand has helped her paws, and the sea swimming salt water helps heal up quicker?

thanks for the input swisstim, I do a couple of runs a week with Holly and this has no effect on her pads at all (probably because she’s running at 1/50 her usual speed!)

1/50th speed sounds about right! Rudy is a pretty small dog – the collie whippet cross is certainly not as fast in a straight line as an off the peg whippet but she can corner harder than most for some reason. She weighs 11.5kg which I guess makes her pretty light on her paws – what about Holly? We trained her up (as I’m sure you did) with easy rides first on woodsy local singletrack first before going on to gravel/sand/rocks stuff

been clocked at 27mph by my garmin

I did the same with Ted, with a GPS tracking thingy strapped to his collar. Clocked him at 34 mph. 😯

The whippet is, I believe, pound for pound the fastest animal on the planet.

Here is a dog called Eddie who I saw lure coursing a few years ago:

Nice work goon…I’ve been wondering about strapping the Garmin 500 on to her collar for a true speed test…. Initial test was her chasing me on the bike, but I need more accuracy and stats ; ) Heart rate monitor for dogs anybody ; )
Great picture, that is pure concentration on speed. Love it

I guess also lordmerchant I did a bit of work with Rudy to start with to get her to follow me rather than going in front, so in spite of being fairly handy down trails I might well be holding her up. She knows the ‘behind’ command when we start riding, and just follows the bike. I didn’t fancy her stopping in front of me to see if I was coming…and buzzing her up the bum/running her over/breaking myself…

The whippet is, I believe, pound for pound the fastest animal on the planet.

Nahh that’ll be a Peregrine falcon, assuming you’re taking “on the planet” not too literally.

I was. 😉

could put a garmin on palmer but since i can pretty much outrun him myself… i can’t see us busting a record.

The whippet is, I believe, pound for pound the fastest animal on the planet.

How does the pound for pound bit come into this? are you dividing top speed by weight to calculate a value?

@swisstim, Holly is not a pure-bred whippet my partner and I think she is a cross with either a lurcher or a greyhound. Having said that she is rather small. You have a point about cornering..in a straight line she is as fast as stink, but when cornering or turning at speed she turns in an enormous arc. Trained Holly for riding in much the same way as you mentioned bridleways and woodlands walk rides before going off-road proper. She obeys very well for the most part, but all of that tends to go out of the window if she gets scent of a rabbit, there has been many a ride when we’ve come home with a rabbit…infact she got hold of a rabbit the other day and it was riddle with mixie!

just to show her size heres a pic of her next to me (myself looking particularly dopey in this one)

How does the pound for pound bit come into this? are you dividing top speed by weight to calculate a value?

yeah, I also heard this bit of info..infact it’s on my tea coaster so it must be true!!

If your dog is coming home repeatedly bleeding might i suggest you find another eay of exercising her?

would not say it is repeatedly, infact I have refrained from doing so because of the bleeding issues. She gets plenty of exercise, the biking is infact a tiny percent of the total.