Like most new mushers, I thought training dogs meant hooking them to the gangline and putting on the miles. I could get my hands on about training and tried to apply what I read, but it still seemed as though I was just along for the ride. Over the years I spent hours listening to and watching other experienced mushers. I began to visualize what they described and incorporated what I could into my training runs. Training a dog team is more than taking the dogs for a run.
Training means having a strategy and identifying specific objectives for each run.
PART ONE H eat build-up occurs during exercise. Muscles are able to convert on the order of 20-30 percent of the chemical energy they use into mechanical work. Thus, 80-70 percent of the energy production of an intensively working dog ends up creating body heat. When muscles get too warm, they function less efficiently. They demonstrate this spirit in vivid ways, and often become known as the sparkplug of the team.