Let us use this Sticky Thread to post useful, relevant articles on conditioning. You don't have to post a hundred articles all at once, LOL, but just maybe an article a day (or a week) to give us all time to think about it / question it / or go with it. To start things off, I am going to post an article on the metabolism of Alaskan sled dogs, and how some scientists are trying to relay it to human marathon runners:




These dogs are given a 60-70% fat diet, and travel incredible distances (100 miles/day), without ever seeming to get tired. The initial belief was that what we learn about dogs can apply to human conditioning, however what was found that the dog is unique and (where we cannot process fat-into-energy very well) the dog has a 400% greater capacity to pull turn fat into useable energy, and has a metabolism that prefers to draw from fat, even when carbs are available, which is in stark contrast to the human metabolism. In fact, here is a key quote:

  • "Stranger still, by the later stages of a race like the Iditarod, glycogen stores actually increase, indicating that the dogs are relying almost exclusively on fats for fuel. It is as though a cellular switch is flipped following the first hard day of racing, after which the dogs’ muscles seem to prefer burning fats over carbohydrates."

How do you think we as dogmen can apply this to our bulldogs?

Jack


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