Champions' Corner

PRE-SEASON TRAINING IN ALASKA

By Egil Ellis / January 3rd, 2010

Up until now, mid October, our adult race dogs has been exercised on the dog walker since mid July. They have run pretty much every other day for three month and have accumulated 300 - 400 miles just trotting along.

This type of training is low impact and fairly low intensity training that builds the dogs up slowly and carefully to get them ready for tougher training later on in the season. We have been using a walker for pre-season training for the last fifteen years and found it to be a great tool for controlled and fun summer/fall activities.

The idea for the dog walker originates in the horse walker used for hot walking horses. The dog version is greatly modified to hold up to the dogs actually pulling on the arms and has a reliable brake system to keep them from going too fast. The speed is controlled by an electric motor and the main brake system comes from the air brake system of a semi truck. Our walker is 75' in diameter with ten arms and can take 20 dogs at a time.

When hooking up 20 dogs that are pulling hard at the end of the 38' arms you need good brakes and a rigid construction, safety is priority here! The dogs are started out at 20 - 30 minute runs, stopping at half time to change direction. I let the dogs run at a faster speed the first few minutes when they are very eager to get going. As they start to settle down a bit I slow them to a easy trot at 7 - 9 miles/hour which is the speed they run at for the remainder of the run. The workouts are slowly increased to where they run for 1.5 - 2 hours by mid October when team training in harness takes over.

As you can see from the YouTube videos the dogs really enjoy this type of training and are still excited and wanting more after each workout.

Myself however, can't wait to have it over with after three months of watching the dogs going around in circles. Now we are ready for some teams to be hooked up and some trails to be blazed.

See you down the trail! Check out some exciting walker training videos on this YouTube link; www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOpG8VZkDcA

Egil Ellis www.egilellis.com