My Dog’s Running/Training Schedule

November 10, 2017 /
Updated Mar 2, 2020

The typical week for my dog consists of 3-4 runs ranging in distance from 5-10 miles. On off days obviously she is still getting multiple short walks and a longer walk in. Average weekly (running) mileage for her is between 15-25 miles a week. I would say that it is rare that she completes more than that in a week.

Rest Days

I think that this is a very important note for increasing mileage in dogs. You cannot communicate with them and will not know if something is tweaked or bothering them. I give much more rest days to my dog than I would myself for this reason. It’s easy to skip a rest day if your body feels up to it but it’s much more risky when you don’t know what your dog is feeling.

Because of this, any day when we do something significantly above our norm, whether it be a faster pace or longer distance I give my dog two rest days. As the norm slowly increases for your dog over time you will need to adjust rest days, but I let my dog guide the process rather than me plan it.

Half Marathon

My dog has ran a half marathon. We followed my dog’s typical training schedule mentioned above. Please note that this is typical for my dog after running with her for over 2 years… we did not jump up to 5 mile runs overnight. The week leading up to the run my dog ran on Monday and did not run again until the race on Sunday. So instead of running 3-4 times a week the week of the race she only ran twice. This put her weekly mileage near 18 which is near the lower end of her weekly mileage range. I just wanted to point this out as it’s important to note that even though one run was significantly longer and more intense, the week on the whole was a bit lighter as is typical for regular runners.

What’s next for Viira?

She’s done one race and I don’t currently have any plans for her to enter into another race. I’d love to do a dog 5k with her at some point but I think I’d want to take her to one first and not run and just observe to get her used to the environment of a dog 5k first.

My Dog’s First Half Marathon - Brokeman’s Central Ohio Race Report