0209: Canicross with Nick Weis

Runner and coach Nick Weis introduces us to the fascinating world of canicross. Visit Nick and Joy’s LuckyFoxKennel.com for more information or to inquire about coaching.  http://www.luckyfoxkennel.com/

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Even if you aren’t taking up canicross, check out the cool gear for dogs and humans from Non-stop Dogwear.

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Interviews referenced in this episode:

0201: The Iditarod with Dr. Vern Otte

0139: Animal Chiropractic with Dr. Kimberly Hunt

Celebrate 5 years of Rosie Fund by supporting our campaign to sponsor 50 dogs. You can donate on our website or Facebook page. You can also contribute by making a purchase from the store on our website or buying a t-shirt at Bonfire.com.

Music for this episode is provided by alternative string duo, The Wires. Visit them at TheWires.info. Learn fiddle and cello-fiddle online — even if you've never played before — from Laurel Morgan Parks and Sascha Groshang at FiddleLife.com.

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The transcript for this episode is available on the Dog Words Buzzsprout page: Buzzsprout.com/840565.

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Transcript

NICK  0:03 
Majority of our dogs are actually rescue dogs that were labeled either difficult to adopt or unadoptable because of high energy. And so if you're looking for just a partner to go and have fun with, honestly I would go and suggest looking at the shelter for the dogs that say need an active family or you know needs exercise or something like that. Because a lot of times those are some of the best dogs that you can run with.

PHIL   0:31 
I'm Phil Hatterman and this is Dog Words presented by Rosie Fund. Today runner and coach Nick Weis introduces us to the fascinating world of canicross.

If you're new to this podcast, in each episode, we explore the world of dog care and companionship. "We save each other" is the motto of Rosie Fund, which simply means the more we do for dogs, the more they do for us and they already do a lot.

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A few weeks ago, we started adding transcripts to Dog Words episodes. The automated transcription is fairly accurate but it is necessary to review each document before posting to make sure there aren't any substantive errors. So it will take some time to get all of our archived episodes transcribed. If there's an episode you would like moved to the top of the list, let us know at RosieFund.org.

Next time on Dog Words we welcome back dog behavior researcher Dr. Ellen Furlong to discuss a clever study of dogs' self-awareness.

The mission of Rosie Fund is to provide humans with the resources and education they need to give senior and harder to adopt dogs a better life. We thank you for joining our mission.

Today's guest on Dog Words is fitness trainer, Nick Weis, who is a canicross trainer and until we stumbled across you on the internet, Nick I had no idea what that is. So welcome to the show.

NICK  2:55 
Thank you for having me.

PHIL   2:56 
You're our first canicrosser. What do we call people who do canicross?

NICK  3:00 
I guess a canicrosser. That sounds good to me.

PHIL   3:04 
You're our first canicrosser and can't wait to share with our listeners what that is, exactly. Obviously, you're on a show called Dog Words so I'm sure you have some involvement with dogs. So we're gonna circle back to that. But have you always been a dog person?

NICK  3:22 
Yeah, so I got my first dog when I was six months old. She was a giant German Spitz mix. You know for the first 10 years of my life Spitz breeds were what was dogs to me, you know, pointed ears and curled tails. That dog passed away when I was 10 and always wanted to Malamute. Got a Malamute when I was in my early 20s. And now I have nine sled dogs.

PHIL   3:51 
And you are a canicrosser. So we've got your dog background. Tell us what canicross is.

NICK  3:59 
So canicross is basically the combination of cross country running and dog sledding. You imagine dogsledding like the Iditarod or something like that where the dog has a harness and pulls the sled. Basically canicross is that except instead of the dog pulling a sled, the dog is pulling you as a runner.

PHIL   4:19 
It sounds dangerous, depending on the dog. And I have Malamutes in mind since you were talking about you have nine of them. probably less dangerous with a Yorkie or something like that. What breeds tend to participate in canicross?

NICK  4:37 
At races I've seen everything from you know, Great Danes all the way down to Chihuahuas.

PHIL   4:45 
Are those different classes? Or does everybody race against each other?

NICK  4:49 
It's all one class. Everybody races against each other. ow, you know, like I've competed at the World Championship level on three different occasions. The top guys at the World Championship level, will actually race with a breed — it's a specialized breed called Greysters. They're basically a mix of German Shorthaired Pointer and Greyhound.

PHIL   5:10 
Okay, because I was thinking there's probably not too many Great Danes at the elite level.

NICK  5:16 
No. No. The elite level are purpose bred sled dogs. Greysters dominate it. You also have a few Eurohounds, which are German Shorthaired Pointer and Husky crosses. You'll see Huskies and stuff like that. And so my wife and I, we have one Malamute, we have two Greysters and then six Huskies.

PHIL   5:40 
As was noted earlier, you've been around dogs all your life. Have you been around running all your life? Or when did you start doing that?

NICK  5:47 
I started running in junior high. I ran all through junior high all through high school. Actually went to college to run. Ended up getting hurt my freshman year in college and had to take about 18 months off. After that, I was kind of frustrated with my fitness level just because I knew I was never gonna be as good of a runner as I had being a college runner. Actually, it was that Malamute that we got that really got me back into running. Like I mentioned earlier, I always wanted a Malamute. I had done my breed research. I knew that they were high energy. I guess I just didn't know how high energy he was going to be. And when he was about six months old, my wife and I had a conversation we're like, "We have to find some way to burn energy off of" — Ruger is his name — "or he's gonna destroy our entire house." And so did some research for things we can do with him and found online canicross and so started running with him. And the rest is history.

PHIL   6:44 
Too few people do that. When they have a dog that's destructive, they try to train it out of them. Try to reward them for doing nothing. When they have a dog that has high energy. That's what that dog is. So I commend you for sticking with the dog and not just neglecting it or saying, "Well, this is just a bad dog." You did the right thing. You figured out, "This is a high energy dog, what can we do to burn this energy?" You found something that fit your lifestyle and you started doing canicross. Now I've looked online and saw the tethers that you have with canicross. 'Cause I see people jogging all the time with their dog and they have the leash, you know, wrapped around their wrist or just hanging loose. Or occasionally people who are running and their dog isn't even on a leash. Which concerns me in the environments where I see this happening. Describe how you are attached to the dog and canicross.

NICK  7:39 
The dog wears a pulling harness. If you google any dogsled race it's a harness very similar to that. They're not holding from their collar so their breathing is not restricted in any way. And then you wear a weight belt. And then you have an elastic line that connects you to the dog. And you definitely want elastic there because if you don't, A - it can be hard on the dog, and B - it can be hard on you.

PHIL   8:05 
Yeah, we've all had the experience walking our dog where you're not paying full attention and then they lock in on a set and just plant or pancake. And even if you're not running, it can almost pull your shoulder out. So I can imagine you're going full...

NICK  8:19 
You're exactly right.

PHIL   8:19 
... speed and one of you has to stop or trips or change direction.

NICK  8:25 
You hit the nail on the head there. It's all about trying to reduce that sudden jar that can happen anytime you have a dog on a leash.

PHIL   8:33 
Couple months ago we had retired veterinarian Dr. Vern Otte on the show who volunteered multiple years at Iditarod and talked about the dogs will know the route and that when they changed the route — which is going to be really interesting this year to see how dogs respond because due to COVID, they rerouted things so that they wouldn't be as close to some of the villages and they've covered different terrain and just go up and back and so they've reduced contact. But a few years ago, they even just changed a route with, uh, they used to go out on a peninsula and instead of going out on the peninsula, they just cut across and there was a lead dog who had done the race enough times that he knew that the human was wrong. Like, "We go out on this Peninsula. We don't just cut across. That's cheating." And it took like two or three years before that lead dog would finally accept that. "No, we've changed the route." So with your dogs that you run with, how well do they know the route? Are they leading? Are you leading? Do you have to change up so that they don't get locked in on a specific route so that they do have that flexibility? How does that work?

NICK  9:40 
We work very hard on command so that the dogs know whenever I say, "Turn right" turn right "Turn left" turn left. We do try to change it up a lot. Now in saying that, for a race that we do year after year, some of our dogs you can go the entire race and not give them a single command and they will do the route perfectly. For example, Ruger our Malamute. He's probably the absolute best at knowing directions for a dog. We have a trailer, an enclosed trailer that has air conditioning and everything that all of our dogs travel in when we go to races and what not. And you can put him in there. There's no windows to the outside. He has no idea where he's at. He should have no idea where he's at. But every time we get five minutes away from someplace that we run, you can hear him start to howl in the back of his trailer.

PHIL   10:25 
He knows you're there. So it's some sort of connection to magnetic fields or smells or combination, or just we don't deserve dogs. They're too smart for us or too good for us.

NICK  10:37 
Exactly. Yeah.

PHIL   10:38 
How long is the typical race? Is there even a typical race?

NICK  10:43 
The typical race is somewhere between one mile and five miles. May tend to gravitate towards about that 5k, you know, three mile race.

PHIL   10:53 
Is it the same sort of terrain that you would get on just your typical 5k that people are familiar with?

NICK  11:00 
Generally speaking, they're off road, just because dogs that are really pulling hard, they can hurt their paws by running on too much on asphalt. And so running on dirt and gravel and trails through the woods and through a field, that that's a lot easier on the dogs' joints and their paws. So most of them are off road.

PHIL   11:19 
And how do you train for this? Because the dog has perhaps more energy than you. Do you run as much as they do?

NICK  11:30 
Our training is actually threefold. The first part of it is I just get out there around with my dogs quite a bit. Running them together. The second part is I do train my dogs some with them running without me. So like I mentioned, we have nine dogs. We'll train a group of them pulling an ATV. That's the equivalent of like weight training for a person.

PHIL   11:50 
So you just put it natural. And...

NICK  11:52 
So actually, we don't put a neutral. We actually leave it in gear but not to help out more to hold them back. Because if you leave it in neutral, you actually burn out your brakes quite quickly. My mobile ATV shop knows me pretty well as the guy that burns out the brakes on his ATV way too quickly, so. But then the third part of the training is I go and run by myself, just because, you know, we race it as a team and the human is always slower than the dog. And I'm the weak link on the team. And so I have to work to improve that pat for us to race well together.

PHIL   12:27 
You train other people to do canicross. Are there people who do this just for the fitness or just for the fun or just for the bonding with their dog with no interest whatsoever in racing?

NICK  12:42 
Oh, absolutely. My wife and I have a coaching business where we target canicross athletes. And, I mean, we have some of our clients are people that basically all they want to do is just lose a little bit of weight and run with their dog and maybe have a race that they would like to complete in the future. And then other of our clients are all the way up to working to qualify for their national team for the next world championships.

PHIL   13:09 
When do they typically hold the World Championships? Because I'm thinking over the last year, a lot of World Championships have had to accommodate the COVID impact.

NICK  13:20 
Yeah, so there's two different international organizations that sanction a canicross rotating and ship one is IFSS. That stands for International Federation of Sleddog Sports. The other is ICF, which is International Canicross Federation. Each of those organizations hold their world championships every other year, but they alternate years. So basically, there is a World Championship every year. You have IFSS World Championships in odd number of years. So 2017, 2019, 2021. And then ICF World Championships are even number years. So 2018, 2020. Now, the 2020 ICF World Championship was postponed to 2021. So this year there'll actually be two assuming they don't get handled again due to COVID.

PHIL   14:13 
Again, I had not heard of this before. I'd heard of skijoring.

NICK  14:16 
Yeah. So skijoring is a different sport. It's basically the exact same except for instead of running your skiing.

PHIL   14:24 
That makes sense. I guess then my question is, how big is this sport? It's big enough to have a world championship and two governing bodies, international governing bodies. And not that I know everything, but not big enough that I'd heard of it prior to a couple months ago.

NICK  14:41 
Yeah. So here in the US it's actually very small. Over in Europe is actually much bigger than it is here. In fact...

PHIL   14:49 
It seems like the sort of thing that the Scandinavians and the Germans and Poles like Northern Europe seems like they would be all over this.

NICK  14:57 
Hey, you you're absolutely correct. In fact, you know, when we travel to Europe for races, we often get asked when we check into hotel rooms which sponsor's picking up your tab for the stay. And so that's how big it is over there.

PHIL   15:13 
And you just kind of mumble some big sponsor and see if they'll pick up the tab and...

NICK  15:20 
No. We have to kind of answer sheepishly, "Well, actually, we're paying for it."

PHIL   15:24 
We're Americans.

NICK  15:26 
Yeah.

PHIL   15:27 
So there is sponsors. So there's people who this is their whole thing, just like a big cycling team that's sponsored by FedEx or something. There's canicross teams that are sponsored by big corporate entities that we would know or like a golfer that wears the swag or a NASCAR.

NICK  15:44 
Yeah, and I actually I'm sponsored by Non-stop Dogwear. I don't know if you've ever heard of the company, but it's for dog sled gear. It's one of the largest companies in the world.

PHIL   15:57 
So there's sponsorships with this. And there's international competition. And I would imagine the entry for someone into this sport is not too burdensome. You just have to have a quality pair of running shoes, and a good harness and a dog.

NICK  16:20 
That's pretty much it.

PHIL   16:21 
That's pretty much it.

NICK  16:23 
It's pretty low barriers to entry. And it's fun. I mean, getting up and running with your dog. I mean, it's just something that's really fun to do. It's really exciting to get out there. And participate.

PHIL   16:34 
You can do canicross with any dog that'll run and you were looking for something to burn Ruger's energy. Do people find the dog first? Or do they already have the dog and look for some outlet for canicross? Where do canicross dogs typically come from?

NICK  16:52 
It runs the complete range. You have some people that go out there and buy a dog specifically for this sport. But, you know, majority of our dogs are actually rescue dogs that were labeled either difficult to adopt or unadoptable because of high energy. And so if you're looking for just a partner to go and have fun with, honestly I would go and suggest looking at the shelter for the dogs that say need an active family or you know needs exercise or something like that. Because a lot of times those are some of the best dogs that you can run with.

PHIL   17:27 
Those are also the dogs that have a challenge in getting adopted because they often do not present well in a shelter. Because you go in and you want to make a connection with that dog that is sitting there and looking you in the eye and the dog that's bouncing off the inside of the kennel, because it's going to get its walk just after you leave, you're gonna to miss out on that dog. There's been so many dogs that we've either sponsored through Rosie Fund, or that we've met in volunteering at shelters that are labeled as not for the novice walkers or only staff can walk them or you have to have a special harness or they're hard to get in and out of the kennel. And what I've found — not all of those dogs because some of them do have some socialization that they need to learn. But with many of those dogs, get them out the door and start running. And after a few blocks of them running, they don't have to necessarily keep running but just knowing that running is an option seems to calm them down. That "Okay, this guy gets it and we're gonna get to run."

NICK  18:31 
Actually, one of our dogs — Oso he's the shelter dog that we got from heartland Husky rescue down in Oklahoma — the rescue actually told us after we got him that it didn't work out with us, they were giving up on him. He was just going to become a permanent rescue dog, stay with them. And they were going to quit trying to adopt him. But basically, what would happen is every family that came and looked at him, the second they touched a leash, he would start screaming, start jumping, and just was completely unmanageable. And they told us afterward that every family that look on the second they touched the leash, they didn't even walk him they said "Nah, we're good."

PHIL   19:09 
'Cause they think it's an aggressive dog.

NICK  19:11 
Yeah! And, you know, we picked up the leash to take him out for a walk, my wife and I did, and it was like, "This is great. He is going to love running so much. This is — he's the best dog here that we could get."

PHIL   19:23 
It was just his enthusiasm for, "There's the leash. I'm gonna get outside. I'm gonna walk. I'm gonna run. I'm gonna get fresh air. I'm gonna get sunshine." And, yeah, adopters misread that all the time. And it's understandable that they might not trust the staff or volunteers who tell them, "No, this is a great dog! When we walk it once we get it out. It's..." "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. okay. Can we look at this puppy that's sleeping in the next kennel?"

NICK  19:52 
Yeah.

PHIL   19:53 
"That's I think more our speed." But yeah, that's that's great. Find a dog that matches your lifestyle and there's more than enough of them in the shelter.

NICK  20:02 
Exactly.

PHIL   20:04 
You indicated that you started this because you're looking for something to burn all of Rugers energy. Is there playtime for Ruger or is this pretty much all of Ruger's activity?

NICK  20:17 
No. 'Cause all of our dogs, when we're not home, they stay outside because if they were put in the crate all day, they would be unmanageable whenever we got home. That they need time to go run and play and wrestle with each other and everything like that.

PHIL   20:33 
Sounds like they have a good life. Did this open up a whole new world of dog care for you? You go from having a dog that you're just wanting to find a way to burn all its energy to now it's competing in world competition. Did that change your relationship with your vet and how you feed the dog and just general wellness for the dog?

NICK  20:57 
Oh, absolutely. We always spend what we consider to be, you know, good quality dog food before we really got involved in this. But there's like any elite human athlete, you know, diet matters. Since I've got involved in canicross, I've probably done more research on vitamins and supplements and fish oil and all the things that need to be added to dog food and different dog food brands. And we have a very good relationship with our vet. In fact, I kind of worry a little bit too good of a relationship because I think we probably visit them about once a week seems like sometimes. Having nine athletes — because that's what our dogs are, their athletes — you have to take care of them. Because if you don't take great care of them, they can't perform. They're not happy. And that's the biggest thing is we want them to be happy.

PHIL   21:45 
It's tough with dogs as far as making sure they're happy, because they love you. And so they're always going to be happy to see you. But we talked about the way dogs will hide pain. We had Dr. Kimberly Hunt, a chiropractor, on who said that if you see your dog, take a spill, and then walk it off you think, "Okay, they're fine." And then a month later, "Oh, my dog is limping. I don't know why." It was because a month earlier, they took a spill, but dogs will hide it. Because in the wild, you show weakness, you're going to get cut from the herd. Or you're going to lose your status or your hierarchy in the pack. So you can't have a dog always tell you when they're hurt. And also, they can't tell you, "You know that dog food just kind of is heavy in my stomach when I run." Whereas as a human, "You know, I ate that protein bar. I'm never eating that protein bar again 'cause that didn't get me through the race." Whereas with a dog, you just have to be in tune with them it's I guess intuitive? Or do you do some sort of checkup on them on a daily basis or weekly basis, in addition to your weekly veterinarian visits?

NICK  22:53 
It's both. Every time we put a harness on or off of them, so every time they train, we always check range of motion and check their — especially we check the paws make sure you don't have a because that's where we found they're most likely to hide something is they can get a cut on their paw, not show it at all. And then you offer running and you make that cut worse. Like the...

PHIL   23:16 
 'Cause the dog will suck it up like no human ever could. And hide that pain because they want to please you. They don't want to show weakness to the rest of the pack. And they will go until they can't go.

NICK  23:31 
You're exactly right. And then, you know, the second part of that is just knowing your dog. I mean, a lot of the training we do with our dogs is just learning them. I mean, yes, there's physical conditioning of it, but it's learning to read their body language and from that aspect, if one of our dogs was having an off day, we know that pretty quickly because we know how they should be acting, you know, a half mile into a run, a mile into run, two miles into a run. And if they're not acting that way. We know that something's up and we need to get it checked out.

PHIL   24:01 
That's a lesson for all dog owners — knowing their dog and going back to what you said about every time you put the harness on checking their pads. I'll admit there's been times where I've noticed our dog Peaches limping and then you see a cut. And you can tell that's not a new cut.

NICK  24:21 
Yeah.

PHIL   24:21 
How did I not notice that earlier? But there's no reason why this animal that depends on you and loves you and that you love in return shouldn't get a checkup from you every time you go out for a walk. You're putting the harness on whether it's a canicross harness or just clipping a lead to their collar, check each of their feet every time they come in from the yard, check their feet. We do that when it's muddy out. We check their feet, selfishly, because we don't want them tracking mud. But if you do it every time it's easy to clean the mud off and then when there's no mud, you're also checking to make sure that your dog is healthy and you're checking the range of motion on their joints. Because if a dog is limping or showing some other signs of injury or distress and you go to the vet, they're gonna ask, "Have you noticed a difference in the range of motion?" Well, if you don't have a baseline to compare it to, like, "I don't know if there's an issue with their range of motion. I don't know what their range of motion is."

NICK  25:19 
Well, yeah. And if you have multiple dogs each dog's range of motion is different. I mean, just like people, for example, Ruger, he's a very inflexible dog that we have. Denali, another one of our dogs, she's extremely limber. And so if you were to compare Denali and say, "Well, she's more flexible than Ruger." Well, yeah, but that doesn't mean that she hasn't lost range of motion because of some injuries, because you started out with a much more flexible body to begin with.

PHIL   25:20 
Yeah, and also like humans, a dog can be asymmetrical. It can have one range of motion, and it's left hip that it doesn't happen, it's right hip. And so if you just see, "It's right hip doesn't move in the same range of motion. I think there's something wrong with the right hip." It's just like comparing the two dogs, maybe the right hip is fine. And the left hip has more range of motion than the right but not as much range of motion as it used to. And that's actually the one that's a problem.

NICK  26:12 
Yeah.

PHIL   26:12 
Or that tighter, right hip might be compensating for the hyper mobile, left hip. So we could talk forever about the biomechanics of people and dogs. But the bottom line is, know your dog and know yourself, so that you can take better care of them. So this is a growing sport, just the fact that we're having it on our podcast Dog Words. It's going to explode overnight. But I'd really like to bring people's awareness to this that there's structured exercise that you can get with your dog and it will benefit you will benefit the dog. There's the opportunity for being competitive in this or just being casual and having fun with your dog. If somebody wants to, rather than reinvent the wheel, access a trainer such as yourself, how would they contact you, Nick?

NICK  26:58 
I want to contact me. So easiest way is probably through Facebook. If you look up Lucky Fox Coaching, that's the name of our business, they in contact us that way. If they want to do just research on the sport in general, if they go to NonstopDogwear .com, they have some very helpful resources for, you know, what you need to start and get into the sport that way. And they can also do what I did, I just googled "running with my dog" and kind of took where the search went from there and found what I wanted to learn.

PHIL   27:27 
Well I will put links in the description to make that search easier for people. I am excited to see the future of canicross. And if you ever have any exciting news to share about any of your races, particularly any international races, let us know so we can update our listeners. Any final thoughts before we let you go, Nick.

NICK  27:48 
If you're gonna participate in canicross, know your dog. And the most important step to get into the sport is just get out there and do it. Take your dog for a run and see if you and your dog enjoy it.

PHIL   28:00 
And enjoy it is the key that no matter what level you're at with this, a beginner or a world champion, it should be fun.

NICK  28:10 
Absolutely.

PHIL   28:11 
You're spending time with a dog. Nick, thank you so much for enlightening us today and we look forward to having you on again.

NICK  28:19 
Thank you. I enjoyed talking with you.

PHIL   28:28 
I'm Phil Hatterman and you've been listening to Dog Words presented by Rosie Fund.

Thank you to Nick Weis for joining us today. Links to his website LuckyFoxKennel.com is in the description along with direct links to his coaching page and social media. Also check out the really cool gear at NonstopDogwear.com. It's not just for racers. This is really cool stuff. There are also links to the Dog Words episodes we referenced in today's interview. If you find an old episode you like, be sure to share it with your friends.

Next time on Dog Words, Dr. Ellen Furlong discusses dogs, self awareness.

A big thank you to alternative string duo The Wires featuring cellist Sascha Groshang and violinist Laurel Morgan Parks for playing the wonderful music you've heard on today's and previous episodes of Dog Words. Supporting The Wires supports our mission. Learn more about The Wires at TheWires.info and download their music on iTunes. Check out FiddleLife.com and learn to play fiddle and cello fiddle online from Laurel and Sasha. Even if you've never played before.

Celebrate five years of Rosie Fund by supporting our campaign to sponsor 50 dogs. You can donate on our website or Facebook page. You can also contribute by making a purchase from the store on our website or buying a t-shirt at Bonfire.com. Links are in the description.

As always, please download, subscribe, rate, and share Dog Words. This helps us with sponsorships. Then Rosie Fund can help more dogs. Support Rosie Fund by following us on social media and please subscribe to the free Rosie Fund YouTube channel. Our latest post features a sweet KC Pet Project dog that's available for adoption. Your donations help fund the Rosie Life Starter Kits that make sure the senior and harder-to-adopt dogs have some of the items they'll need in their forever home.

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Thank you for listening and remember, we save each other.

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