20mile ride?

huskydamage

huskydamage

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How long would you expect a 20mile long distance ride to take? (or if you are someone who does these kinds of rides what's an acceptable time to complete it in?) I'm tempted to give it a go but worried I'm too slow and everyone will be waiting for me! I regularly do 10-15 miles on my pony but we are not fast,she is older so i don't go mad and im just wondering if my 10mile time x 2 is just too slow for an event where people are waiting for you
 
Looking in the EGB members hand book, pleasure rides have a minimum speed of 8km which is a smidge under 5 miles an hour, I'm sure the ride last weekend had no minimum speed for pleasure riders you just had to be back at the venue by a certain time, or before they locked the gates!!
 
I did a long hack yesterday with a friend using roads, field edges and bridleways. I have just mapped it on Mapometer and it was 10.5 miles, took us just over 2 hours. We had a good mix of walk, trot and canter (but a very forward canter).

Hope that helps - why not ask the organisers, they should know average timings and be able to help.
 
It depends probably on the ground you will be hacking over as well, hills will be harder work so might need to go slower.

We've a 4 mile hack which is all roads & it took me approx 40-45 mins today, there were a couple of hills that we trotted up but the majority of the hack was an active walk.
Hope that helps a bit :)
 
I have done a 20 mile ride in 3 hours on my very fast veteran pony. Organisers said the average for that length of ride was 4.5 hours
 
thanks for the replies, I will check with the organisers- it's a pleasure ride but I just don't want to take the p as some of the start times would suggest to me they aren't expecting you to take ages! Just I do 10 mile hacks a fair bit so I would really like to give the longer one a go and get my money's worth/have a bit more of a ride! I got an endomondo tracker on my phone recently and these are a couple of my last rides... I'm just thinking looking at these I recon it would take me 5+ hours to do 20 miles. My hacks are 90% road though so I don't get to canter much
14,47miles in 3hr36
11.13miles in 2hr33
 
teddypops said:
I have done a 20 mile ride in 3 hours on my very fast veteran pony. Organisers said the average for that length of ride was 4.5 hours
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that is fast! How old is yours? :) My girl used to be pretty quick as she is so hyper would trot everywhere non stop. She has aged a lot recently though (is 23) Some days she is exactly the same but she tends now to trot more as 'bursts of energy' with more walks in between before she shoots off again. I don't think she is able to continuously trot for long periods of time like she used to. The mind is willing- body not so much!
 
I occasionally help out on pleasure rides usually on a check point. I do not think that the organisers would be very pleased if anyone took over 5 hours and also was a late starter. Everyone at the venue or on the last check point has to wait to go home until the last riders return. If you do decide to do a 20 miler and know that you will be riding slowly try and be an early starter . I have spent many a boring and sometimes worrying hour waiting for the last 1 or 2 riders to come through my checkpoint. You do not if something has happened since they came through the last checkpoint. However it is much easier since the advent of mobile phones to find out if they are ok
 
Ruftysdad said:
I occasionally help out on pleasure rides usually on a check point. I do not think that the organisers would be very pleased if anyone took over 5 hours and also was a late starter. Everyone at the venue or on the last check point has to wait to go home until the last riders return. If you do decide to do a 20 miler and know that you will be riding slowly try and be an early starter . I have spent many a boring and sometimes worrying hour waiting for the last 1 or 2 riders to come through my checkpoint. You do not if something has happened since they came through the last checkpoint. However it is much easier since the advent of mobile phones to find out if they are ok
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that is exactly want I want to avoid! I would of course pick the earliest time, I just wondered if the fact some times were later was an indication of how quick they expected you would finish it
 
My pony is in his teens but has a lifetime of going 14km/hr so it would take us around 2.5 hours. I don't think there's any issue in making a day of it at a slower pace though- go for it!
 
There will always be people who are much quicker, so its fine for them to go later. The ride I did sunday had the majority of the pleasure riders who were doing shorter rides vetting before some of the longer rides. They were also told what time they needed to be back by, and asked to go earlier if they thought they would be longer.
 
huskydamage said:
that is fast! How old is yours? :) My girl used to be pretty quick as she is so hyper would trot everywhere non stop. She has aged a lot recently though (is 23) Some days she is exactly the same but she tends now to trot more as 'bursts of energy' with more walks in between before she shoots off again. I don't think she is able to continuously trot for long periods of time like she used to. The mind is willing- body not so much!
Click to expand...

She was 23 at the time I did the ride, 25 now. She is amazing! She is very fast and forward going. Am planning to do the same ride this year on her!
 
When I had my old mare (she was 25-29 at the time) we did lots of fun/sponsored/etc rides, some up to 25 miles. We always set off at first horses as she only had two speeds, very slow and very fast. It would take us hours but we had a great time. I suggest starting as soon as you can and also mention to the person on 'check in' that you will be taking it steady in case they are monitoring start and finish times then they won't think you have got lost.

Have fun :)
 
I'd go with 4-5 hours at a guess assuming just under 5mph as an average speed. If lots of chances for a canter / gallop then that would up your speed but if mainly walk/trot then that's what I'd expect.
 
If it's an EGB ride, the rules have changed this year and the lower pleasure ride speed is now just advisory - you will no longer (within reason) get eliminated for being slow. However, the organisers may set a time by which they want everyone back, so if you do think you may be slow you can ask for an early start time.
 
How do you all ride for 4-5hrs without getting a numb bum?! If I went on hacks that long I'd get off and walk/run part of the way but I never see that on pleasure rides. I'd be about 1 1/2 to 2 1/4hrs on a 20 mile ride, depending on whether or not I got stuck behind a bunch of slow ones on a few tracks where you can't overtake. I did have a fit horse though. We didn't do more than 5-10min walking at any one time.
 
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