Sunday, January 8, 2017

Canine Fitness Workshop

Catching up a bit...

In early November, my vet clinic, Calm Animal Care, brought Jennifer Hill, a certified canine physical therapist (and also Holly's personal PT), to Kila, Montana to give us a 2-day workshop on Canine Core Conditioning. She also recently became a Fit Paws master trainer and brought some cool equipment and awesome instruction on conditioning our 4-legged athletes. 


Even though I have done a lot with Jen in the past with Holly (rehabbing her after each of her injuries), I learned quite a bit at the workshop...particularly how I allow Danee to "cheat" at certain things and be sloppy, which isn't helpful in actually conditioning her.



I got a lot of ideas on what to work on at home that's beneficial to core conditioning and how to modify certain exercises with things we already have a home to make the fun things we do with our dogs easier on them...such as paddleboarding...



While I don't own those blue donuts, I do have other things I can place a car-ramp on, or a step bench, to work on paddleboarding exercises over the winter.

Danee and I had fun...she really loves doing these kinds of things and is always excited to see the balance equipment come out :)



Holly came too and was able to do a few things while Danee rested between exercises. Jen was able to give me some modified exercises with Holly to avoid stressing her bad knees. She particularly loved the stretching and massage session we did...



We have a lot we can play with inside when winters sub-zero temperatures and deep snow keep us from playing and exercising outside for very long.

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