{the dog blog of Outside magazine}
How to Heel Your Dog Behind a Bike
by Grayson Schaffer | on September 1st, 2009 | in Features, The Wildrose Way, Training, Video Clips
by Grayson Schaffer | on September 1st, 2009 | in Features, The Wildrose Way, Training, Video Clips
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We’ll teach heeling to a bike just like we’ve taught all of our other skills so far: slowly and in increments. Once you’ve got a good loose-leash walk or off-lead heel, you can start this. (If your dog won’t heel ordinarily, it’s unlikely he’ll heel when you add such a big, mechanical distraction.) When you’ve got this down, it’s a great trick for riding around town with your pup as well as having him join you on some mellow spins through the woods. Remember, don’t run your dog flat-out behind a bike until he’s at least a year old. And even then, keep the distances short. Puppy joints aren’t tough enough to take prolonged pounding.
- Walk with your dog at heel on his normal side while you push the bike on the other.
- Once you’ve mastered that, move the dog to the bike side and walk with the bike between you and the dog.
- Finally, mount up and ride out. If you’ve built up each of the steps slowly—over days, not minutes—you should have a dog willing to heel beside you as you ride.
This is great but for most single track riding you do not want your dog running next to the bike because the trail is not big enough for both of you. Sooner or later you are going to hit him with a pedel stroke or he is going to block the best approach line.
Get a good 25′ retractable leash and work with the dog running out in front of the bike. You can use a carabiner to clip the leash to your camelback so your hands are free. Teach your dog commands for turning left, right, slowing down, and stopping just like he was pulling a dog sled.
By letting the dog run out in front of you that frees you to climb that technical stuff or come down difficult spots without worrying about hitting the dog if you go down or need to get to a different line.
Anyway you do it go out there with your four legged friend and have some fun.
I just wish the video would load. I have a wonderful black lab. I would love to be able to take him on bike rides. It just keeps saying it is loading, it has been doing this for over 30 minutes with a DSL connection so I’m thinking something must be wrong.
I think you’ve got to hit the play button even though it looks like it’s still loading. Let me know if that doesn’t work and we’ll get it up on YouTube as well.
Great point about a singletrack heel. The caveat we’ll make as we do more of this is that we prefer the dog to be behind us. This prevents the dog from being the first to interact with other bikers, hikers, and wildlife coming down the trail ahead of you, and it keeps him from getting run over if he suddenly stops to sniff at something in the trail. It also gets him used to the idea of falling in line behind you, which is just what you want when he’s following your skin track on skis. (A six-pack to you if you’ve trained your pooch to break trail for you, though.)
-Grayson
Regarding taking a dog with a bicycle:
There are a few things that make my blood run cooler than when out on the cycle track with a dog on a retracting lead whose owner is talking on a mobile phone. Their reaction time is invariably too long and they do not really know where Doggy is. Perhaps worse is the same but with the owner riding a bike, holding the lead with one hand, the phone with another and controlling the bike single handed: oops! If you must take doggy, then leave it off a lead and train it to look after itself. I have had no near collisions with happy well trained dogs running free.
Owners who wish to demonstrate their superior dog control are a real pain. Once again they have a hard job controlling themselves before attending to a nervous pooch.
Generally, I stay away from the cycle track on busy days and use the road. It’s safer.
I want to claim the six-pack! My dog breaks trail for me and I have the pics to prove it!! There is a whole world of -joring out there, e.g. bikejoring, skijoring, hikejoring, rollerjoring, etc. It initially started with northern breeds (huskies, samoyeds, etc) but can be done with most other active breeds. The concept is very similar to dogs pulling a sled. However, some amount of training of the pooch is needed, even for those that were specifically bred to be sled dogs.
I went through a short training period with my siberian husky pal, and now he breaks trail like a champ every time we go skijoring! Don’t let the training discourage you, as the rewards are immense. For me, I get to experience the joy of being outside doing a wonderful activity with “man’s best friend”, and in addition, get to sip on a six-pack that Grayson is sending my way!! What can be better?
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