Taking dog on bike ride – yeah or nay?

Was it the off the lead and out of control spaniel that decided to sit in the middle of the second last double at Swinley last Sunday?

No it wasn’t. We only stop mid section if one of the kids stops. The dog stays between us at all times. And we only go when it’s quiet.

Not fun coming round a corner at a trail centre to find a dog in the middle of the trac

Would you say the same if it was my son? The point about the trail centre is that it is for all abilities. I like to blast around as fast as possible on my own too (still chasing sub 28 min for Blue run). But when I’m riding with the children (and sometimes dog), I ride to the child’s abilities. If that means somebody’s “Strava run” is ruined, suck it up and push it on the firetracks and climbs. That’s what I do.

Bridle ways towpaths etc yes dog bring your dog I will when I have one
Trail centres, I don’t think they should, I nearly took out a Labrador that ran out in front of me at swinley once and the owner had a go at me,

I’m a pro dog person and I find it in conceivable that anyone would take one to a trail centre.
What next,track days at Brands Hatch?

I’m not personally in favour of “Trail Dogs” While I sort of see the appeal and it lets people kill two birds with one stone (walk their dog and get out on the bike), it just ups the risks for other trail users, it’s a purely selfish act IMO…

Owners seem generally unconcerned about their dogs getting in other trail users way and assume that the rest of us are as comfortable as they are having to avoid running dowm their pets…

TBH OP You’ve got too much going on even if it is a “slow ride”, your riding a bike, supervising your kids, there are other forrest users and your mutts running about off the leash so I really don’t think you can claim it’s under any sort of control can you, which is of course your primary responsibility within the law as a dog owner.

Either walk your dog or, if you have no time to look after it properly, get rid of it…

A dog is not a cycling accessory its a pet.

Hopefully your son would not try biting me when he is startled nor run in front of my wheel.

Despite near dog accident, safely passing a school group several dads and kids I made a 25.15 this was mid week morning when I was expecting / hoping it would be clear. I won’t ride there at weekends after yesterday’s experience simply as it will be too busy / risky for someone who wants to push it.

I love dogs too, I just can’t see how owners can’t grasp how it is an extra unnecessary danger to riders and dogs….

The likening a small child to a dog is plain dumb. Small children move slow and and stay staitionary/ follow the trail. Dogs on the other hand move fast zig zag over the trail and when startled act unpredictably. To pretend they behave the same and give the same level of risks shows you have not encountered many of these situations,

Either walk your dog or, if you have no time to look after it properly, get rid of it…

A dog is not a cycling accessory its a pet.

Thanks for that super-patronising summary.

My dog is under my control when I ride. I do pick up after him (he doesn’t crap on the trail anyway, prefering to find himself a nice patch of grass). He’s also wormed regularly, so the toxocara argument falls on its arse – if you’ll excuse the pun.

So I’m going to keep riding with him where and when I feel it is safe to do so. I’m sorry if the very thought of that offends some of you.

Not that we have a dog but it’s on the cards. Thinking about a wee Russell or fox terrier so have been thinking about this myself. IMO…

Nay to a trail centre…too busy and the potential for upending some one else or pissing people off is fairly high.
Yes on your local trails. Less busy (maybe not) and lets face it…most local trials are used by dog walkers anyway.

Thanks for that super-patronising summary.

My dog is under my control when I ride. I do pick up after him (he doesn’t crap on the trail anyway, prefering to find himself a nice patch of grass). He’s also wormed regularly, so the toxocara argument falls on its arse – if you’ll excuse the pun.

So I’m going to keep riding with him where and when I feel it is safe to do so. I’m sorry if the very thought of that offends some of you.

Some people clearly need a bit of patronizing.

Dog owner’s estimation of “Under control” seems to vary pretty wildly TBH, Some would never dream of taking their dog down bike trails where fast moving bikes could squish their four legged, surrogate child…

Picking up it’s Shite is your duty as an owner anyway, would you like a round of applause or something?

Letting it run along side your bike on trails which have other users to consider tells me you don’t really give a shit about anyone else though, I take it you do the same on “not too busy” roads then?

Swinley and Thetford have both been mentioned, where you’ll find riders of all abilities heading in both directions on some trails.
you’ve basically added a new unexpected, unpredictable, low level, mobile, furry obsticle for other people to have to deal with, and you have no way of knowing how they will react. So long as your happy though…

If your dog needs walking then why not actually take it for a bloody walk? what’s so terrible about the idea?

You can still go to the woods to do that. Let it off the leash if you like, so long as it’s trained and responds to your commands then I’d say it can be controlled adequately, with you on foot you have a better chance of actually being aware of what your dog is doing, where it is and a better awareness of what is going on around, you can call it to heel or sit far sooner when you hear approaching bikes.

Of course like many other Dog owners your a bloody expert and can’t be told, and the rest of us should apparently accommodate your inability to GAF…

Fine then, You bought it, you apparently care for it and if your OK with someone like me unintentionally maiming it and then billing you for a replacement front wheel then carry on being a prick…

then carry on being a prick…

Nice. Aren’t you a charmer. Your insights into me are fantastically accurate and I have now learnt my lesson.

Glad to have helped

And another thing….the trail at swinley I was riding is graded “blue” which according to the FC,s definition is for intermediate cyclists with basic offload skills, I’m not sure small child with stabilisers on first ride falls into that definition. It is a problem with the surfaced type trail the FC seems to be producing, it encourages walkers, push chairs, dogs, small children to use them as we’ll as proficient cyclists

..I reckon they should be a suitably graded ‘obstacle’ right at the start of the trails, like at morzine there was a severe black run that had a massive gap jump to get onto it. Maybe for a blue it could be roots or a small rock garden….

Tangent I know…

so what happens if you hit a fox or deer or small child on the blue run at swinley would you ask their parents for a new wheel?

if you are riding so fast you dont have time to slow for a dog that might perhaps be in your way, what would happen if it was a small child the other side of a berm or switchback?
maybe people should asses their surroundings better before getting into these situations.
many time have I come across animals, children etc on trails but have never hit one or caused an accident to avoid one (maybe i just ride too slowly..).
and I dont get upset that something / one has spoiled my Strava or whatever its called, just deal with it and carry on enjoying the rest of the trail.

think people need to realise that everyone will do their own thing so suck it up, dont let such petty things upset you and get on with it.

cookeaa – Member

Glad to have helped

🙄

In 10 or so years riding trail centres

Near misses with children = 0
Near misses with wildlife = 4 (deer, badger, squirrel and mouse)
Near misses with walkers = 1 (on the fastest part of the QE descent)
Near misses with dogs, mostly riders dogs = at least 20 or so, and getting worse, virtually every time I ride a trail centre now.

The difference between children and animals has been ignored several times. They behave differently on the trail and animals present much more of a risk.

The trail at swinley is designed to encourage more competent riders to go fast safely, before I did a strava run I did a loop at a slower pace to asses it. It is in my opinion a well built track that it is safe to go fast on, most parts are clearer visible up ahead so you can see slow moving people on the trail. What you can’t see easily is the dog popping out from the side of your vision and across the trail.

Wouldn’t go trail centre but never had no probs ,

Would you say the same if it was my son?

On a green/blue route no

On a red/black yes.

Just as dogs shouldn’t be on trail-centre trails at all, children (young) shouldn’t be on red/black sections/routes.

My 7 year old nephew CAN ride, not just for his age but for someone a few years older. He would still be out of his depth on SOME red-routes and ALL black routes simply because he doesn’t have the fear/awareness that comes with age and experience.

Message from my dog:

You may drive and Audi and ride an Orange 5 and get KOMs, but you are still slow and suck.

I am a rescue dog from Northern Canada and walking sucks. Running along behind a bike is ace.

If I poo in a field then it’s just a drop in the cow poo ocean that is sprayed on the fields as fertilizer.

I see waaaaaay more bear poo on the trails around here.

I am lucky to be able to run in a land where people ride bikes fast and competently. I’m so happy that I don’t live in the UK. Woof…

Do it.

My dog says, “You lot take cycling far too seriously”.

Common theme in all of this seems to be the word “Swinley” – must be a right dobber magnet of a place 🙂

^ Yeah it reminds me of people sat in traffic moaning about all the traffic on the road. Go somewhere else!

Absolutely.

must be a right dobber magnet of a place

Blame the dog owners, why can’t they take their dogs to the myriad of tax payer funded multi million pound purpose made facilities for them and their dogs; or just down to the local park where there is an area set aside for them to safely exercise their dogs seperate from the childrens play area………….

The anti-dog arguments could perhaps be better rephrased as “Please take your dog only when it’s going to be quiet, i.e. not at weekends when the whole world and his dogOrange 5 will be there, and pick up its poo.”

However, I think there are some rabid anti-dog people on here who will surely disagree with me.

For the record, I went to Thetford on Thursday (without a dog, but with some friends) and we saw no-one. So the whole “your hound might hit a cyclist” argument is bit thin and dog-eared.

irelanst – Member

why can’t they take their dogs to the myriad of tax payer funded multi million pound purpose made facilities for them and their dogs; or just down to the local park where there is an area set aside for them to safely exercise their dogs seperate from the childrens play area

Because it’s a lot of fun. Try it!

[EDIT: and also there aren’t any multi-million pound dog-walking facilities near me AFAIK].

EDIT: and also there aren’t any multi-million pound dog-walking facilities near me AFAIK

I was being just a little sarcastic!

Just to add to the above: We never had a dog when we lived in England, we got one when we moved to Holland. We have taken her back with us a few times and to be honest the UK is pathetic when it comes to catering for dogs; hotels allowing dogs– no, restaurants – no, shops – no, dedicated free running trails – no, exercise areas – no, whingers–oh yes, plenty of them.

If we move back to the UK I would really find it difficult to provide the necessary environment for our dog.

Someone mentioned above “Either walk your dog or, if you have no time to look after it properly, get rid of it…” they frankly have no idea about the exercise requirements of a high energy breed, there is no way in this world that a ‘walk’ would be enough for my dog, she has to run, and she has to run for miles every day. I can manage a decent length run every other day but there is no way that I can run for the 10 miles plus a day that she needs (and certainly not at her speed)– she did 40km on Tuesday with me on the bike and by the time I got out of the shower she was sat there with a tennis ball for a game of fetch.

Irelanst: I wouldn’t worry too much. The person making that argument was so inarticulate that s/he had to finish off their last sad and ill-informed little diatribe by calling me a prick – which tells you everything you need to know about them…

Irelanst: I wouldn’t worry too much. The person making that argument was so inarticulate that s/he had to finish off their last sad and ill-informed little diatribe by calling me a prick – which tells you everything you need to know about them…

I think he may be frustrated by your “My dog is under control when I ride” delusion. Its not on a lead and having been a dog owner myself you and I both know that no matter how well trained the dog is, sometimes it will do whatever the hell it likes.

The person making that argument was so inarticulate that s/he had to finish off their last sad and ill-informed little diatribe by calling me a prick

I just read back through the thread and it didn’t come across like that at all.. not even a little bit

I don’t mind seeing dogs there, but I wouldn’t take my dog to a trail centre.. Dogs can be a right bloody nuisance, and as a dog owner I think you have to have the humility to accept that fact..

No dog friendly hotels you say?

http://www.britainsfinest.co.uk/hotels/search_results.cfm/searchclasscode/924

I think he may be more frustrated that his intellect ran out and he had to resort to puerile name calling. I’m not deluded about the dog – I accept that he could potentially be unpredictable – I was just making the point that if I chose to take him to Cannock on a wet Wednesday morning in February I don’t think there’s any harm being done. On top of which – he has never met me, never met my dog, and so the patronising suggestion that I only take the dog riding because I’m too feckless to walk him is fairly idiotic.

Yunki – I fully accept that dogs can be a nuisance – that’s why you won’t see me at a trail centre with mine this weekend. Just walking mine I get wound up by crap owners who don’t give a damn what their animal gets up to. But I don’t feel the need to take too seriously anyone who’s only recourse in argument is petty insults.

But I don’t feel the need to take too seriously anyone who’s only recourse in argument is petty insults.

I don’t mean to labour this point, but why not..?
It was far from the only recourse, in fact apart from a rude word at the end the rest of the post was very coherent and raised some valid points..

erp..

I’m being awkward and it’s past my bedtime 😳

Because it’s like a child having a tantrum. I actually agree with some of what he’s got to say – but if people can’t keep cheap insults out of it then they’re not worth talking to.

but if people can’t keep cheap insults out of it then they’re not worth talking to.

That’s a pretty discriminative outlook..
Is that because you can’t respect them or because you believe that they are unlikely to be able to conduct a rational discussion..?
Or do you take offence at the lack of decorum..?

I know this is a complete tangent, don’t feel obliged to indulge me but it’s a subject that I take a keen interest in..

Hang on a minute here, you call him puerile, idiotic and inarticulate yet you use the argument of petty name calling to justify trashing his comments? Make your mind up mate and maybe I will take you seriously, not that I think you’ll care if I do or don’t
Gnite.