Canicross | Dalmatian | Training | Races | Cross Country | Trail Running
It's all here! Follow us, Duncan (The Biped) & Dizzy (The Spotty One), on our adventures, as we take on the world of Canicross together. Documenting our training, races and lots of fun challenges along the way.
We've yet another word for "steady", I use "easy" and even more extreme "walk"' for when one of us needs a break from running. She's possibly the only dog who calms down at the word walk lol
Walking to heal is overrated anyway, just ask Maxus. I reckon recall is more important for off lead times to give your arm a break. Shes a cutie pie with so much potential, and big bro Dizzy will show her the ropes.
@@cariboudle6915 definitely! She’s doing well with the recall, trying to overcome distractions from birds will be the big challenge!! She’ll be walking on a belt rather than me holding the lead for some walks before too long now too… maybe I’ll come and canitrek her in the Zombies sometime 🤔
wow this is going to be my new favorite channel, cant wait to watch all the videos :) Have 2,5yo GSP that i started running trail races with. Planning on getting gopro with chest mount and record it :)
@@-reky welcome! That’s brilliant, you guys are going to have so much fun! For filming I do all my race footage on a head mount, it’s a lot better than the chest mount which I find doesn’t produce great footage for running XC.
Will be watching Peggy’s progress with interest 🐶 my Dalmatian pup Franco is the same age & I’m trying to get back to fitness to run with him eventually 🏃♀️🐶 & Dizzy is amazing & so good with Peggy 😁
@@Mangohead75 ah amazing! How old is your GSP? Yes, there is GSP mixed in a few generations back in her line. Then some other types of pointer and some greyhound even further back.
@@thatspottydogruns Hercules is 15 months. I also have a 3 year old springer spaniel. I started off lead running with Hercules at 10 months after talking to my vet.just short runs with plenty of stops . I will be looking to do longer runs with him in the autumn. Training him was easy as he just copied Waffle my esp
@@Mangohead75 brilliant! Yes, it’s all about building them up gradually. Let us know how you get on go a bit longer!!! Peggy will be focussing on the middle distance stuff and leave the long stuff to Dizzy!
I live in Perth, Australia and our summers are pretty brutal. During hot spells it gets well into the 40's and might not drop below 30 over night. This is our first season doing CaniX and Scooter and our local club but I've been running with my dogs (Field Labradors) for a couple of years now. Even in winter our conditions are marginal for pulling and our racing and training is constantly being revised. The "know your dog" tip is key. Our older girl won't push herself too hard but our boy Merlin is a natural puller and would probably do himself damage if we weren't looking out for him. We go for jogs (out of pulling gear) at 5:30-6:00min/km pace up to about 24-25degrees. We do CaniX in harness in interval sessions out to about 20 but try to keep the pace conservative. Scooter we have less control of his pace. He seems to do a lot better under 10 degrees. We start to alter our plans if the temps are about 12-13. You could never run these temps with a husky but most short coat breeds can be acclimatised over time. My tips are/what I do: -plan your training week around the forecast -never be too far from water - if you are then take water with you. I load up a hydration vest so I can wet the down as we go. -watch their panting rate and learn what is normal for your dog. For Merlin his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth alone is not an indicator, if he has spatula tongue we stop. -if you have a high drive dog that likes to run out in front. The moment it drops back to your heel you need to stop and assess how they are doing. -run early in the morning before the sun is hitting you. lots of 4am starts -every 10-15 minutes wet your dogs down -if you think you dog is too hot then stop, wet them down and walk them back
@@jeremyringma Thanks for the brilliant tips 🖤🤍 It’s great to hear from people doing Cani sports all over the world as we all have such different conditions to do it in. Plus, this place 🌍 isn’t getting any cooler so as you say acclimation of dogs to warmer temperatures is going to be key to continuing these sports in the future!
can i ask how to get your dog started? I have a beagle nearly 4 and I have tried but he likes to run behind. If he know a dog is in front he will pull. But there are no meet ups near me.
@@TITHEAD90 Hi - great you want to get started. My best advice would be to start really short and simple. Make it really fun, and get them pulling for 100-200m with lots of encouragement and praise. Then gradually increase the distances each session. Keeping it short and fun sets the dog up to succeed and will help them learn what you are asking them to do! If you have someone who can go on a bike out front to act as the hare then you might be able to go longer and just keep encouraging them to run out front. Be patient and have fun 🖤🤍
Congrats on your PB! Amazing pace! I’m a newbie and I was wondering how much faster did your pace increase by running in the canicross harness? If you were to run that exact same course but without Dizzy, what would you estimate your time would be?
Thanks! And thanks for watching 🖤🤍 we’ve actually since run this course again this year and ran 18:07! I run 5000m on a track in ~18:50-19:00, so teaming up with Dizzy takes a minute to maybe 90 seconds off my time on cross country courses like this. BUT… we are a slight anomaly with it being so close. Some of the men with bigger, faster dogs probably have around 90 seconds - 2 minutes knocked off… and the lighter Women CAN have up to 5 minutes knocked off their time by a powerful well trained racing dog! What type of dog are you running with?
@@thatspottydogruns Thanks for the breakdown, it is greatly appreciated. I am based in Canada and Canicross is just starting to gain traction here so videos like yours are a great help to learning about this sport. I've always ran with a dog but I didn't know they could be run like this. Now that I saw Canicross, I am excited to learn as much as I can!! I'm glad to learn what is realistic to expect by having your dog pull you. Your times are so fast (very impressive BTW) but I'm glad to know that it shaves off only 90-120 seconds. It gives me a more realistic as what to expect once my 50lb Coonhound is fully trained. She is about the size of your handsome Dalmation. That is crazy to learn that it can shave almost 5 mins off a smaller woman's times though. I'll have to get my dog hooked up to my wife once she's more trained :) Thanks so much for making these videos! I loved watching you and your dog during a race. Its a very unique and informative perspective And congrats on your even faster times!! Super impressive, to say the least!! Keep up the amazing work!!
This one was brilliant 🤩 courses are usually available to preview the day before yes. Some have different rules about taking your dog on the recce though so we don’t always do it. Plus it’s sometimes not practical arriving a day early to walk the course. If there’s something I feel I need to see to make a decision on I will, but otherwise we just run it for the first time in the race. Also, a few of them we’ve run in previous seasons… it’s amazing how Dizzy remembers the routes 🤯
I've started running with my dog soley due to your content with Dizzy! I live in Nottingham and we've been having great weather, but it's been SO HOT! What are your recommendations on judging when to, and when not to run with your dog? She's of course always ready to go, but it's been miserable these last few days!
Oh how amazing! So we actually have a whole video dedicated to top tips for running with your dog in the heat that will definitely help you!! I find that acclimating Dizzy to the warmer weather is vital to being able to get out in the summer. So that means short exposures to warmer running with loads of slower breaks. This is sometimes in just 200m intervals or so. But once he’s acclimated Dizzy can run 5-8km in up to 15/16 degrees. But every dog is individual with heat and I’d definitely recommend being over cautious. I know he can run at 15/16 with no issues whatsoever, so that is my limit. He’d probably be fine closer to 18 but I’m not interested in finding out 🙂
So last year we did it ourselves and just ran for fun for a few months, then Dizzy had a break whilst it was too hot to canicross and I worked on my own running before teaming back up for pre-season in mid-late August. This year all our training is now set by our brilliant coach and Dizzy has learnt to free run brilliantly, so it could look a lot different. We’ll have to wait and see 😁
Great vid…again! Huge congratulations on your 9th place🎉 legends the pair of you! And the fastest Dalmatian in the UK… not to be sniffed at 🖤🤍 Bet you never thought you’d get to this position when you first started 😊 Super impressed with your determination , motivation and commitment 💪🏻 Congratulations to all the other amazing 2 and 4 legged athletes too 🎉
@@melaniealessandrino3084 Thanks 🤍🖤🤍🖤 we are delighted! I suspect there will be even more entries next season as the sport grows so holding onto a top 10 will be tough!
I am really enjoying your spotty dog canicross videos, I think you capture the experience and attitude brilliantly and I'm buzzing from watching these almost as much as I am when racing with my Benji. Keep it coming please!
Absolutely phenomenal! Love the atmosphere; I really wanted to do caniX with my girl, but sadly I have a sublexing (sp?) patella so, it means that any type of running causes my knee to pop out of socket. A very painful and debilitating condition. Maybe one day we'll be able to do it, but for now, I am thrilled to just watch you guys race and progress. Well done to you and Diz!
@@thatspottydogruns Its something I've considered, but will have to see. Probably a conversation to have with my physiotherapist. Fingers crossed they'll say that type of exercise is OK!
Hahaha! It was some atmosphere to be in, I’m literally yelling “ready” to Dizzy as loud as I can!!! My wife was there watching and said it just kept getting louder and louder and then all of a sudden it was silent as we disappeared off down the beach
Great video! Nice to see how a fast runner does the course. We ran too but were much slower even though Scout loves the water and went straight through each puddle. We're at 17:56 in your video 🙂 Go Scotland!
Oh my lord! That was like a triathlon without the wheels! Swim run swim run🤣. Then you had to deal with competitors running towards you right next to you (first half km or so) that must have been distracting for Dizzy….bless him and then having to shake the water off😟 think his mind was working overtime! Thank God for the right turn at ‘the lake’!!🫢 Brilliant running from both of you….maybe Tri-suits next time 😂
Thanks 🖤🤍 Would be quicker to carry an inflatable dinghy to tow Dizzy across the puddles in 🤣 some did miss the diversion around the lake and ended up standing in waist deep water looking for directions 🫣
💯 - It was the main reason for switching events for Sunday. We were meant to do one more time around this course, but when you see the next video you’ll see it was definitely the right call to switch 🙂
As a fellow Dalmatian owner, I wonder how did you train Dizzy to run so consistently? My dal sniffs a lot during a walk/ run. I have previously just used treats to encourage her to continue running, but any advice would be appreciated!
So I developed an ‘on by’ command that tells him to ignore everything else and carry on doing what he’s doing. It’s one of the commands I use most actually (you’ll hear me shouting “On” in our race videos, which is this command). You can develop it whist walking in the usual way. But now, he just loves the run so much he’s super focused on his job of pulling us along. He always gets a sniff walk a little while after a run where it’s his walk and we’ll go as far/fast/wherever he likes in a certain period of time. Don’t know if he can work out if that’s coming or not though? How old is your Dalmatian 😍
