Well, we are well and fully into the darkness of winter now!  Most of our training is now done either part way in the dark or completely!

Headlights have become our best friend and I am starting to think we should buy some stock in Duracell so we can at least earn some of our money back!

But really, training is going EXTREMELY well.  In fact this team of dogs- all of which, except Goldeen and Creamer, are under two years old- is the best team I have ever trained!

I don't know if it is the genetics of these dogs or the new training system but they are a VERY fun team to run behind!

We have pretty consistently been sticking to the plan of 2 long slow runs with 3 short fast runs.  We have played around a bit with the resting schedule of this plan in Nov. running more than resting.  But I have been watching them close for any kind of physical or mental slumps... haven't really had any, just a brief period when all the females were in season.

Last night we put it all together in a 45 mile race-pace run.  They totally RIPPED IT UP- powerfull the whole way and maintained a nice strong 10-11mph pace.  Even though we did a run where we had to do two laps of a 22.5 mile out and back loop.  And dogs COMPLETELY hate that kind of thing.  So I am sure on a "funner" trail they would have been even quicker and stronger.

Which leads me to the mental conditioning of the dogs.  This is one side of training a set of yearling sleddogs that I feel I need to be most careful.  Physically, I feel these dogs are VERY tough, but mentally, they are fragile teenagers so I am being VERY carefull to keep everything upbeat and fun!

So far it's working and I am having more fun running dogs this year than I have in a VERY long time!

I can't wait to race them and see how they compare to other teams...only problem is that our low snow levels this year keep forcing races to cancel!  One so far, and it looks like another next weekend!  Poop!

Eventually we'll get in a race though, so we will keep training hard so we are ready!

The Late Fall Blues have struck the team!

Feet are sore, attitudes are down, and training is in the pits!

But this isn't all that uncommon, actually we seem to go through it every year to some extent.  This year seems a bit worse because the team is so young.  They have no idea that it will get better in just a few short weeks.  And the in experience is really effectin my young leaders the most! 

They aren't listening, they are running on the wrong side of the rode, they are stopping to drink at every puddle (rather than taking a quick drink and keeping on the move), they are stopping to play with the Swing dogs behind them, etc, etc... Everything they can think of except going down the trail.

I was getting really MAD!

But then- thanks to some good advice from younger brother- I rembered to have fun!

So I have swapped some things around in the kennel so I can run my old main leader Goldden again (Pippin was running him but now he will run Beatrice instead and still keep Fluffy- the winning pair in last years Jr. Yukon Quest).

Andy is going to go back and run with Charlie and the puppies.

And we are going to take a week off "real" training!  The dogs that have sore feet will get a chance to heel up.  The ones that are good are going to go out on a bunch of short, REALLY fun runs.  And everybody is going to have fun and take it easy! (including me!)

Opps, is right!  Boy oh boy did we have a lousy run the otherday!  We were supposed to head out for a 2 1/2hr run but we needed to stop at a creek that we pass about a half hour out to fill up water buckets for feeding later that night.

I have never done this with this team, though my older team- the one my son is running this year- has done it bunches of times.  So I really didn't expect to have any trouble.  Wrong.

To get down to the creek we have to turn off the main dirt road and take a little trail to the river bank.  There I was going to turn them along the river, stop the atv, get off wade out and fill the buckets, get back on, turn the team around and head on down the road for another two hours.

The problem was I have no adult, experienced leaders, and to accomplish the above task requires about 7-8 new commands for the yearlings to learn (well really they aren't new, just applied in a different context than normal... it is stil "gee" for right turn, "haw" for left, "whoa" to stop, and "hup" to go.  Anyway...)

It turns out 7-8 commands in a new context was about 6-7 too many!

The short version is a 10min. stop for water turned into a 45min pain in the neck.  Both the dogs and I were so dispirited by the exercise I decided to cut the rest of the run short and home!

And that leads me right back into the Goal Setting post I started the other day...right where I will pick it up next.....