First Race of the Season...

We had our first race of the season last weekend. It was a little bittersweet, as I was planning to race my young dog, Nia, at the International Canicross Federation Championships in Belgium. Unfortunately, she had some health problems in the run up so we weren’t able to train. We went to a local event instead, and had a fabulous time. I generally bikejor my dogs, as I’m a mountain biker rather than a runner, and the course was a little bit of everything – sprinting across open fields, a few technical turns through the tress and lots and lots of typically British mud.

We had a reasonable run on day one, although Nia lost a bit of confidence running on her own across a wide open expanse of grass, so I hopped off the bike and gave her a hug part way round. The hug paid off on day two and we had a fantastic run, 20 seconds faster than day one despite the going being harder, and no faltering confidence from my little dog. Our closest competitor made a slight steering mistake which cost her a time penalty and we managed to hang on for the win. 

Then I took my older retired dog out in the “recreational” (non-competitive) class. The plan was to let him set the pace and take it fairly easy, but he had other ideas, and shot off the start like the top level racing dog he used to be. A quick jaunt around the course later and he had set the quickest time of the weekend, despite being 1. Old 2. Retired and 3. Not competing.

Maybe he had a point to prove about retirement or something… 

Nia is running in the Dragratten Cross Back harness and I am using the nonstop bikejor line. In this photo I am trialling a bikejor arm made by a Polish manufacturer and widely used in Europe, before we make a decision whether to carry it as stock. The photos were taken by Nick Palliser at the wonderful “Be More Dog” photography (https://www.bemoredogphoto.com )