Do you do sports with your dog? We just started doing dog sports about two and a half years ago, and have found it to be such a wonderful thing to do for dogs and their humans. I’ve got 5 reasons why you should give sports with your dog a try. Remember, not every sport is for every dog, you need to test the waters and find sports both you and your dog enjoy.
Fun
Fun is the most important reason we participate in dog sports. You would be surprised how much fun you can have when your dog becomes your teammate! Sports can be done just for fun, or competitively, but either way, it is a blast! I know, dogs have fun playing tennis ball in the yard, or going for walks, but try sports and take note of how we love the challenge of sports! I bet you humans will love it too!
Bonding
Oh yes, you do form a bond with your dog doing day to day activities, but try learning together, working together towards a common goal. Both you and your dog will learn so much more about reading each other, trusting each other, and working together as a team. Dog sports are a wonderful way to build a stronger bond with your best friend.
Enrichment
Have you noticed how small humans participate in all kinds of stuff from piano lessons, to t-ball, to dancing, to track? Why do they do this? To enrich their lives, find out what makes them happy, and to see what they are good at. The same is true for dogs. Mom exposes us to a variety of dog sports to see which ones suit us best. The sports we enjoy, make us feel good. Both dog and human enjoy participating and learning to work as a team, and if you compete, you can enjoy successes together. A dog is the best teammate as we are never upset – win or lose. Dogs can lead a full life without sports, Trine and Katie did, but sports add a whole new wonderful dimension to a dog’s life with their human.
Mental Challenge
Dog sports force dogs to do a lot of thinking. Watch your dog learn, study, and solve problems – their tail will wag like crazy from happiness when they figure it out. Dogs need to use their minds, and sports keep us challenged. We are super excited whenever we figure out what you humans are asking us to do because we solved the problem, and we make the human happy. Being mentally challenged also wears us out.
Physical Challenge
Dogs also enjoy a physical challenge. You have to know your own dog and what they can do. Nose work, for example, is more of a mental challenge, whereas tracking is physical and mental. Agility is physical, obedience is more mental. Every sport is different which is why we try a lot of new things. We tried Barn Hunt and found it is not my thing, but might be Bailie’s. I’m taking a short summer Rally course right now to see if it will be for me or not, and Bailie is taking an intro trick class. It is fun to try new things and figure out what works for us as dogs and what works with our humans.
If you don’t do any dog sports, consider trying some sports with your dog. There are so many sports out there for everyone, and every dog, for fun, and for competition. I bet if you try it, you will like it! If you do sports with your dog, don’t you think it is a wonderful thing?
those are indeed excellent reasons – and it is just plain fun too
The fun is the number one reason, everything else is just another benefit!
Y’all always have so much fun and we know you inspire other dog families to get out there and have some fun!
It’s so good for pets and people to be out doing things together. For cats, at home cat games are best. I don’t see a lot of cat sports being offered, LOL!
I think i.e. Katie and I need to move in with you guys. Yu can train both of us not to be so lazy!
Getting started is the hard part, but then it becomes so fun and addicting so fast. You can’t help but want to practice and have fun. You also meet lots of other people who share your love of dogs which is nice.
The mom does sports in the WATER! She goes in the pool and does water arthritis moves, water yoga, and water aerobics. Just yesterday she was in our pool doing her arthritis moves. I HATE the water! My mom needs to find a new sport! XOXO Sparkle
You and your mom should try barn hunt or nose work. You would love both sports, and it is real easy on the human as there isn’t much moving around required. The dog works, the human reads the dog and makes calls. It would be ideal for you and your mom. You can do it just for fun too. We just like competing.
I so agree with you… there is a benefit for dogs and for humans… and sporty stuff can be a super glue what holds a team together :o)
It really is something special between a dog and pet parent. If you have more than one dog, each one is so different, it has its own relationship. We love it…but that is no secret. Sorry to hear about all the mess in France. Glad you are alright. Humans can be so awful sometimes.
Oh Emma. You are so, so, so right about that! But we have a problem. Agility classes in our area are not suitable for Bruin (for a number of GBGV specific reasons) and all the other sports don’t seem to exist. Of course, we have nose work, but that just doesn’t sound like much fun. Barn hunting sounds like so much fun, so does lure coursing, tracking, and a bunch of other things – but how can we learn to do them??
New England is not the best place to be for dog sports…
I didn’t find classes near us at first either, but then through Bailie’s obedience class, we found out about another school, and through them we found more, and more, and more. Not sure how it is in your area, but just googling stuff didn’t work for us.
Hope you don’t mind me chiming in here! I am in New England as well and know just how limited we are here. I don’t like to have to travel far for these things. I’m now looking into some online classes – it’s at fenzidogsportsacademy.com. I know they have classes for at least nose work and some other things like agility as well. It might be something you want to look into to see if they have anything of interest for you.
We know a lot about Fenzi and nose work. A friend of ours is in Wyoming and sometimes drives 3 hours each way for nose work class. She teaches herself with Fenzi. It is a great way to learn. Since we have classes available to us, we prefer to get out there with other dogs and people to learn, but Fenzi would be great for your situation. Thanks for mentioning it.
Thanks, Jan! I hadn’t heard of that site, but I’ll check it out. Hopefully something will come up for us!
All we have around here is obedience and conformation events. We take our walks and hope to move to a more dog-friendly area of the country. (Paws crossed)
Minnesota is lovely! Mall of America for your mom, tons of dog sports and schools for you boys, not sure what your dad’s hobbies are, but I’m sure we have them here too. our state is a well kept secret. Mom has me working on rally which is a form of obedience. We both despise obedience, but this rally stuff is a lot of fun.
I am pouring through available dogs for adoption. There are no GBPVs. There was a mix I wanted to meet, but when I called to see if he was still available before going to the shelter, they said he was being adopted as we spoke.
I doubt you will find a GBGV as there are only about 250 in the entire USA. The breed is too new and rare. You may find PBGV’s. They are similar yet smaller.
We feel like it is a good bonding experience
Lily & Edward
We think so too. My very favorite sport is running to the kitchen and back for treats, but the other sports are fun too.
Glad to see FUN as #1 on your list!
Fun has to be number one. If it is not fun for the dog and the human, don’t do it!
We can see how much you all enjoy your sports, and those are such great benefits! As I told your friend above, I am definitely going to sign up for a class at the online Fenzi Sports Academy. For me, it will be a really good place to start. I keep putting it off with so much going on, but I’m hoping to motivate myself to sign up for the first class for August 1st.
Do it! I’m going to take Bogeyman next term, I think.
We dabble but we have fun dabbling. I think we might do a barn hunt workshop later this month and I want to take Mr. N lure coursing sometime this summer.
Fun is what it is all about. We do some dabbling and have our main sports we compete in. It’s so fun trying new things.
I recently enrolled Archer into a Sport Dog Class. It’s been a lot of fun as he’s learning to do obedience on a platform, walk through our legs, do the moonwalk (walk backwards), and balance on a yoga peanut. Yes times 5 for all the reasons you mention above!
That is great! Having fun as a team is what it is all about. Learning is good for your pup too. Every dog likes different things and it sounds like this class is a good one for Archer.
We totally agree with all five reasons!!
Smileys!
Dory, Jakey, Arty & Bilbo
Yay! Sports are just great no matter what the reason is for doing them with your dog.
5 super reasons. Have a great day
Sports are so much fun!
If that sport is being cute, then Sam is a big player! He’s not much into fetch, chase or swim but cute…now that’s something he can get into. I think he’d take gold in cute Pawlympics. ?
My mom never thought of us as dogs for sports either as we don’t do fetch, obedience, or that kind of stuff, but once we started trying we realized how much fun sports can be.
The is one of the more challenging things about being kitties – finding indoor sports we can do with the humans. It’s such a great thing for doggies to do – and for all the great reasons you list here!
Kittie are tough! It’s even worse because cat bro Bert can’t have toys because he eats them all.
Emma you are making mom feel totally guilty for not doing more with me and Taffy. But sometimes there are limitations like money and heatlh that prevent her from doing more. Great tips! Love Dolly
My mom says we suck up all her green papers, but she is alright with that. It isn’t cheap always, but we have so much fun we make it work. Some sports are less expensive than others too.
Those are all wonderful reasons to do sports with your dog. I am positive that all the classes I took with Delilah is what bonded us. I do miss it, one of these days I’ve got to find us another class to take.
It is fun and does help with bonding if you both enjoy the class. It also gives good one on one time in multi pet homes.
Good point!
All excellent points. I want to start agility with Jaxson (pray for me please!)
We feel like every dog these days is a therapy dog and does agility. It looks like a fun sport, but with our long backs, Mom doesn’t want us jumping, so not going to be our sport. Have fun with Jaxson!