A Running Cadence Lesson From My Dogs

Non-human animals are natural athletes, whilst we are burdened (and gifted) with an over active neocortex (that big lump of brain that causes us to solve problems, but worry about them too much).

A delicate wild rose nestled under some larger plants on the edge of FitOldDog’s running trail. Makes you think of ‘The Little Prince.’

Non-human animals just seem to do what they do without really thinking about it, as far as one can tell. Though I’m sure they are having many more great thoughts and emotions than the average human ascribes to them. Ever watched a dog dreaming? That probably goes for plants and rocks, too, but homocentrism, aka anthropocentrism, is alive and well on planet earth!

Cadence, or leg turnover rate, is pretty important for runners and cyclists. When you run, your pace is a function of how fast you complete one cycle of your legs and how far your stride takes you on each cycle. Pretty simple math, really, making cadence a critical issue for overall pace. My dogs can run really fast, and their cadence is always high, so I thought I would take a pointer from them, and the video above shows the results of my efforts.

Learn from the animals, and don’t eat them unless you absolutely have to (but that is another story – a complex one).

-k @FitOldDog