Down in Australia where I live we are offered an oportunity to obtain a title with our dogs called an endurance test oe ET.
This involves a dog and handler to run for 20 kilometers over a two hour period running over a variety of different surfaces such as bitumen, concrete, grass and gravel.
The idea behind this is to see if the dog is fit and at the end of the run is still willing to do a small task such as a very basic bit of obedience.
There is a person riding a bicycle at the front of the dogs and handlers as a pace setter, as this is not a race but an endurance test the pace setter travels at an good pace of approximately 10-11 kms per hour.
The handler has the choice to either run with the dog or they can ride a bicycle next to the dog.
A few years ago I decided to have a go with one of my girls to see if we could both loose some weight, because we were both built for comfort not for speed, and also I had never run 20 kms before so I thought this would be a great challenge for the pair of us.
As you can imagine we started off very slowly but over a couple of months we gradualy got better and 7 months into the training we succesfully completed the task and passed.
Since that time I have taken 3 more of my dogs through to the same title and am in the process of doing another one of my girls.
Without my running partners I know I would still be a big couch potato and so would my dogs but the motivation from the dogs has given me a real purpose to continue running as it is so very hard to say no to a pair of sad eyes saying come on dad lets go out for a run.
