Condition ‘’fitness’’ training for Rottweiler
Dogs do exercise on the way that moving their body, they can’t do static exercises as humans.
In this case moving body means running.
Running can be on different ways or style.
Also can be on different ground and of course different speed.
Some exercise do not require high speed but correct execution yes.
According to the training we want to do we must pick type of the ground, what I want to say here we can’t do tort on bumpy ground.
Fitness training helps us to get the dog in good shape, gain good muscle tone and a strong appearance.
Specifically for a Rottweiler, the appearance of the body should be muscular, strong and able to be active for a long period of time.
But body can’t be too big, too muscular or to massive and not sluggish at all.
Let’s say imagine an athlete who runs a distance of eight hundred, four hundred and one hundred meters, that’s how a real Rottweiler should look.
Unfortunately, today we can see a lot of specimens of the Rottweiler breed, which, according to their external and mental appearance, are not representative species of their breed “too massive, too strong skeleton, sluggish and quite bad character”.
There is three different ways of moving in this case that’s moving body forward.
- Pace “ two same side legs going in same direction ‘’
- Gallop ‘’ like horse gallop race ‘’
- Trot ‘’ two different legs on two different side of the body going in same direction ‘’
Dog shows require only Trot way of move, can be walking or running.
On working trials can be anyhow.
Here I will speak about dog exterior shows and fitness training for it.
One of most important thing on dog show is that the dog must have flat and strong top line ‘’back’’.
Trot is only exercise which can make strong and flat top line
During moving the dog on dog show top line must be still, can’t move up and down.
Huge role play genetic and dog care.
If genetic is bad and the dog has soft or broken top line we can’t do anything to make back to be good.
If genetic is good but we keep the dog fat during growing period while the dog is young the top line will be broken and then also can’t make it to be better.
Let’s say we have good top line, little soft but flat the only thing we need to do is Trot way of running. Strong back muscles that keep the spine straight and flat the dog can
get by trot and only trot exercise.
Here, speed is not important, we can change up speed of running but only because for getting better fitness and condition parameters, better top or back line the dog will get only by correctly doing this exercise.
Young dogs four to five, six months can run slowly by bicycle or jogging by us.
Distance for young dogs about seven, eight months of age can be till three or four km. distance slowly running but with previous one or two months of free running, this period of free running is getting little basic shape for next training stage.
“Free running” I call gallop.
In most cases when I train young dogs about four months of age I walk about two km. and the dogs have free run, in most cases its gallop or mix with trot. As I said on this way young dogs get some basic condition for further trainings.
Dogs about twelve months or more I train on this way that I sit on bicycle and drive medium speed and they free run around me.
In this period and depend on their previous fitness condition I run them about five to eight km. faster or slower.
It’s the same with trot.
I use gallop in winter, spring and autumn time much more than in summer time.
In winter time dogs can train much more and they can cool down their body temperature.
During winter time ground can be muddy, slippery or with a lot of snow so I sit on my quad bike and let dog to run.
For trot we need dry, and as much we can find flat ground.
Summer time is ok for trot because we don’t need speed, we need correctly move so it’s easier for the dog to do it under higher temperature.
During summer time we should train the dog early morning is the best, at the night can be a lot of humidity.
Gallop make hearth beat higher than Trot ‘’ depend on intensity of course but I will say again it’s important for trot how the dog do exercise not speed’’ and this is the major reason why we should do each training under specific weather condition.
About pace nothing much to say then this, for dog show pace is not properly way of move and a judge will warn you for sure.
Pace use the dogs out of fitness condition, dogs with not good body proportion ‘’longer body, longer legs and sometimes every dog after hard training as rest’’.
Never let the dog to lay down immediately after running, let him to walk at least one or two hundred meters so his heartbeat come down.
In this “walking rest’’ we can see that the dog pace, some people say the dog rest then.
Pace is only way of move where the dog rest but not sit or lay down.
