Trail Etiquette – Volume 1
Thoughts | 198 | June 8, 2008 at 9:09 amThis is something that gets on my nerves during a lot of rides at local, loop style trails. If I come up on you at a fast rate, it is not a challenge to go the same speed I am. I don’t know what it is, but there are a lot of riders out there that will not let you pass! They take it as a challenge to go your speed, which they normally don’t, and take up the entire trail.
I am not the fastest guy in all of Atlanta, so I get passed on a regular basis. I have zero problem with this. Every rider is out to enjoy their ride, at their pace. I do not want to mess up a riders favorite section of a trail because of my ego. Why is it that some riders do not get this?
There are beginners on every trail, and the more beginners I see…the happier I am about where the sport is going. The funny part of this entire deal is that the beginners are more likely to let you by than the rider who never rides anywhere but the local trail. These are the riders that I find to be the worst about not following this common courtesy.
When you hear a faster rider coming up on you, pick a spot to either slow down or stop and let them by. This very little amount of time will not affect your ride over the course of the day. This will improve the quality of your ride and the riders around you. If you are the one passing, please do not be one of those riders that passes just to slow down. If you are going to pass, pass with authority and stay ahead.
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Tags: fast mountain bikers, local trail etiquette, local trails, mountain biking, passing mountain bikers, trail etiquette, trail etiquette volume 1, volume 1
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I agree with your passing observations. It seems there are a few categories of riders regarding getting passed. I use the following etiquette of letting the rider ahead know I am coming: call out “rider back” first time you see them, then again as I approach (about 20-30 feet back), so they will have a sense of the speed at which you are approaching and have time to pull over or yield the trail. I always instructed my wife and kids when they were beginners to let the faster rider pass. Still there are the ones who let you pass (oddly many beginners as you observed), but there are others who want to race, or still others who do not acknowledge your desire to pass, causing you to stay back at a safe distance, which seems to suit them fine until you ask to pass explicitely. The common response is “I am looking for a good spot”. I ride most often on a 7 mile flat loop. The trail is narrow and curvy, so there are only a couple of straight sections on the whole trail, and only one of them is wide enough to pass a moving rider. Given that the trail is completely Texas flat, one place to pull over is as good as the next. Unfortunately a lot of the trail etiqette I see on the web favors the slower rider “larger group has the right of way” “rigid frame has the right of way” (I ride a rigid single speed, but that does not seem to get me any consideration). I would really like to see more consideration for faster riders. Let the faster rider pass and be done with it. I try to be patient, but today I ran into a new category of rider. This one had the ipod at full blast, and did not know I was back there for 10 minutes! I had to yell increasingly louder and louder to get him to yield, and afterwards he felt the need to have words with me in the parking lot calling me an A-hole in front of other riders. I feel like I am in a no win situation. I bought a house near this trail so I could get in regular rides without burning gas to go to the trails. I do ride more challenging trails when I can but I would still like to see some of the etiquette I saw when I lived in Phoenix. It is posted at a couple of trail heads explicitely that the slower rider should yield. This is not elitist, just good sense that allows a variety of riders to enjoy the trail.
@Tom: I agree 100% and thank you for posting a great response. The iPod trail phenomenon is becoming more common. I have used an iPod in the past, but I keep the volume lower and check over my shoulder on a frequent basis. I haven’t used it in quite awhile though…nothing really beats the sound of rubber gripping the ground.