Fit with Fido

Let just say running with a dog is slightly harder than running on a treadmill.

Wednesday night I started volunteering at the Seattle Animal shelter, doing their "get fit with fido" program. You basically come once a week (or more), and take a dog out on a 4 mile run. I was quite excited because I definitly miss having animals in my life... and I figured it would be good motivation to run.

I got slushy, a very cute, soft friendly american bull dog mix. Apparently he didn't get the memo that It was going to be a nice easy run, since he started off pulling as hard as he could the first 5 minutes. He really wanted to get that dog ahead of him. And when he finally stopped pulling me forward, it was because he noticed a closer dog behind him. After the first 5 minutes though he steadied into a trot at the perfect pace. We were good partners. However every mile we did stop for a few minutes for water etc, and he did feel a need to pull for the first minute or two after every break.

At the end he also felt like he could keep going a few more miles. Definitly was not tired. It was overall quite fun. And the dogs all definitly looked happy. It seems like a good program, and made me run longer than I probably would have otherwise. Yay puppies.