Sadie's Exercise Program Part 2

Hopefully by now I have convinced you of the importance of exercise now all I have to do is figure out how to fit it into my daily schedule. My daily workout takes me about an hour, after all if I don't stay healthy I won't be around to take care of my dogs. I also believe that each of my dogs should get an hour workout. That's 5 hours a day. Now if I add too that 1 hour a day for grooming and 1 hour for training that's 7 hours a day just to maintain the dogs. Where do we get the time?

Years ago this was not a problem leash laws were not what they are now and I could go for a cross country run and take my dogs with me. We could all get a good workout together. Some of my fondest memory's are of getting up at 5am and going for a 10 mile run with my first German Shepherd Heidi, but she is long gone and so is my ability to put my knees through a 10 mile run. I used to be an avid runner, running at my peek as much as 109 miles in 4 and a half days. Then last year I blew out my knees while, of all things, running with my dogs. The doctor said that the cartilage is going in my knees and if I want to avoid surgery no more running.

Even though I miss the running I can replace it with rowing, biking or some other aerobic sport but what about my dogs? I had to find a way to keep them in shape as well. I am still trying to work this out and it is not easy. I have had to sacrifice some of my workouts so that I have time to take the dogs out on the bike. I can not combine their work out with mine because if I go slow enough to take them on the bike it is not fast enough to give me a work out. Right now I have reduced my trips from 4 to 3 by hooking Pepper & Lizzy together and taking them at the same time. Later I will be hooking Sadie and Storm together reducing the number of trips to 2. Sadie is just learning to run with the bike so I still have to take her by her self. She is also only up to 3/4 of a mile and Storm can go on all day. Then there is the problem with the weather.

Winter is just around the corner and I can't ride my bike in the snow. Originally I was going to go to the gym and workout indoors in bad weather but then again what about the dogs. I thought about training them on a treadmill but I know how boring that is for me let alone for the dogs so I had to come up with another idea. Which I did. Cross-country Skiing.

Cross-County Skiing is a very good aerobic workout, it is done outdoors, and I can take the dogs with me. As long as my knees can take it I have decided to give it a try. I used to to down hill skiing but have never done cross-county let alone with 4 dogs. My only misgiving is that I will get lazy and let the dogs pull me and loose out on my workout, again.

Here is the plan. I have just order the equipment for the dogs, 4 harnesses, and a gangline for 4 dogs. Once I receive the equipment I will start training the dogs. Fortunately I live right next to the Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath (http://www.canalwayohio.com/) which runs from Cleveland South to Zoar Ohio. This is where I normally go biking and the path is only about 8 feet wide with vegetation on both sides so unless the dogs decide to take off into the woods dragging me behind I should have no problem training them to stay on the path. By the time I teach them to pull me either on a cart or on my bike we should have some snow and they will be ready for the true test. The way I see it the worst case is that they pull me the whole way and I will still have to come home and get on the stationary bike to get my workout. But in any case we should all have a good time and they will get a good aerobic workout along with the pulling motion required to build up their chest and the tendons in their legs for future shows.

Next time Team Work