Work out!

When my parents said I could have a dog for my graduation present there were some rules involved. The main rule was that the dog had to come from the IDAPI training program at the IHS. One of the downsides to that was that you picked a dog out from a few dog profiles online, applied for it, then met it instead of being able to meet the dogs yourself and pick the one that best fit into your lifestyle. Fortunately, Toby and I were a pretty good match, otherwise I would have to have gone through the whole process again with another IDAPI class. But Toby and I both like to sleep late, and hang around the house most of the day, one thing we didn't quite match up on was energy. Toby does not stop moving unless he is told to!
The first few months I had him, we went on two half hour walks every day and he was still wired all the time. Toby is a runner, he is built for speed and he craves a good run, constantly! I on the other hand enjoy a nice leisurely walk. So after months of struggling to keep him in the "heel" position on our walks, and watching him bounce off the walls, I bought a treadmill at a yard sale and taught him to run on it to supplement our walks. It helped, but barely at all.  Desperate to get him the exercise he obviously needed, I pulled out my bike and held on to his leash as he ran along, it worked really well! He was surprisingly unafraid of the bike and was very excited to be running outside.
A few weeks later, we were on our bike ride when some ducks suddenly flew up out of the canal next to us! Toby lunged forward and across the front of my bike sending me to the ground. Amazingly, Toby was untouched and I just had a couple scrapes and bruises.    -Find out what I did, after the jump-


The biking came to a sudden halt and we went back to just walking.
A couple months later, as I was wandering around the web I came across a dog sport called skijoring, where dogs pull people on skis. I looked up a little info about it for fun and soon discovered bikejoring. I learned that there was equipment you could buy that helped keep you in control while your dog pulls you on a bike. Fascinated, I researched more and found a site of tips. I read that tying the leash just under the seat makes it easier to control the bike. I cautiously tried it out with Toby and found that it really worked!
Over a couple weeks I encouraged him to pull my bike using a leash tied under the bike seat and a harness on Toby so that he wouldn't hurt his neck. Soon he was pulling me all over the neighborhood!
Since then I bought a leash coupler and dollar store collar to make things easier. I wrap and clip the collar under the bike seat then clip one end of the coupler to it and the other end to Toby's harness. This way I can easily switch which bike he is pulling which is perfect for family bike trips!
So Toby and I can now get our exercise together and it made us a more perfect match, he is just big enough to pull me, and small enough for me to control.