Horses and Cyclists...

We have received a letter from a local horse rider. (see below). 

I think/hope our club members are pretty good at calling ahead to horses and waiting for a signal to pass, I could probably slow down a little more when passing 'head-on', regardless its a timely reminder of how to deal with horses, she mentions off road riders, but it applies equally to our roadie Brother and Sisters:

Dear Sir

Re: Horse Riders 

I am writing to ask a favour of you.

I am one of a number of Horse Riders regularly using bridleways across the South Downs in the Denton/Firle/Alfriston area and we are experiencing frequent incidents where our horses are frightened by cyclists, so much so that they shy and bolt, which as I am sure you understand is potentially dangerous.

Can I firstly say that this is NOT a witch hunt or complaint against off road cyclists, in fact your club members and other cyclists are usually very helpful with gates etc., and usually very friendly, the problem is that through no fault of their own, they do not understand horses fully.

Horses are not very brave, in fact they spend most of their time on the lookout for ‘Monsters’ waiting to attack them and cannot rationalise. When they see a bike approaching silently at speed they see it as a predator and their first instinct is to run! It is even worse when cyclists approach horses from behind and there is no warning as to their presence as they are silent.

We would be really grateful if you could possibly make your members aware of this problem and to ask them to pass the word to other offroaders in the area, and to ask them to slow right down on their approach to horses and to shout from a distance to make us and our horses aware that they are there and we can then move to a safe area to let them pass.

A frightened horse is not only a danger to itself and its rider but could also cause harm to cyclists in its panic!

Thankyou so much for taking the time to read this.

Yours gratefully