As the sporting world starts to flex its collective muscles in anticipation of a return to full participation, greyhound trainers face some unique challenges.

No greyhound has raced in March 23rd. There is no review due until May 7 at the earliest. Even if the go-ahead was immediate, that represents a minimum of six weeks without racing for the majority of racers.

There can be very few, if any, trainers who haven’t had to bring an injured dog back to racing. For the majority, it is an on-going and continual process. Dogs pick up injuries, and in the vast majority of cases, they return to racing. The timescale might be days, weeks or months. (For ‘greyhounds’ also read ‘professional athletes’)

However, it is clear to any of us that monitor the industry closely, that some trainers manage it better than other. Attaining race fitness is a slow process and this resumption will be on an industrial scale.

So what does the science say about how long it takes to prepare a greyhound to trial?

John Kohnke, the Star’s vet for nearly three decades, was arguably the first ‘greyhound vet’ to write about the emerging science of bone re-modeling. An academic vet, he was also very well versed on physical conditioning for both greyhounds and horses.

This is what he had to say about preparing a greyhound for a return to racing.

Ed

Basic Training Programs – By Dr John Kohnke BVSc RDA

A racing greyhound should to be trained in a step-wise manner in early training, not only to achieve basic muscle and cardio-vascular fitness for the step-up to galloping exercise to optimise stamina and speed, but also to ensure that the musculo-skeletal system has time to adapt to the higher loading forces of an all-out gallop around corners. This can take at least 4 weeks on the lead with the occasional short 150 metre sprint-up and then another 3-4 weeks of speed and anaerobic training to reach fitness for racing. Achieving optimum strength and stamina are the initial goals of any training program, without initially aiming for speed, to help prepare the greyhound’s physical, metabolic and mental systems for racing.

Ensuring a programmed, step-wise conditioning program, with measures to maximise health and vigour, is the foundation for a successful and long term race preparation.

Strengthening Exercise

In human athletes, conditioning exercise to increase muscle strength is often achieved in the gym using weights, a rowing machine and an inclined treadmill to provide incremental or step-wise increases in loading and power needed to perform the exercise, thereby increasing strength.   Studies on the physical adaptation during training of flat racing horses, have indicated that strengthening exercise requires a minimum of 6-8 weeks of trotting, cantering and incline work, working up a hill or carrying the additional weight of a heavier saddle and rider.

Unfortunately, those types of exercise programs cannot be used in greyhounds, which really only have 2 speeds – walking on a lead, moving a bit faster on a treadmill, or all-out galloping speed.

Therefore, strengthening exercises in greyhounds are basically carried out by lead walking, with the occasional hand slip or short free gallop. Ideally, some incline work, such as walking up a hill or walking on an 10 degrees inclined treadmill, will help to develop and strengthen the back and hind limb driving muscles. However, the incline or slope of the ground or treadmill elevation should not be greater than 10-12 degrees at a continuous walking speed for 5-10 minutes. Higher inclines can overload the lower back and cause pain and injury in the lumbo-sacral area in the flank.

This type of controlled exercise will also help to gradually improve oxygen uptake and overall muscle strength over a 3-4 week period prior to commencing faster sprint exercise. Obviously, the increased loading with controlled sprint training at faster speeds, is important to stimulate bone strength, muscle capillary flow and vessel numbers within muscles to increase blood flow, as well as joint cartilage thickness and resilience, all of which are not effectively challenged by lead walking.

Improving Stamina

Stamina or ‘endurance to perform’ for an extended period, can only be conditioned by a step-wise increases in speed to adapt metabolic pathways and decrease lactate production as the speed of exercise increases.

Really, stamina and speed are inter-related, because stamina can only be increased by exercising at a given speed over a chosen distance. There are no short cuts in this process.  The greyhound must be in optimum health to ensure the best response, which involves a well balanced, adequate diet and digestive efficiency by regular worm control.

 

Time Scales

Strength and stamina take some time to improve because the muscles, joints and bones have to adapt to strengthen and be able to withstand the increased loading and metabolic demands once fast exercise is introduced.

Following the increase in muscle blood capillaries which occurs in a young greyhound in its first preparation, or ideally if it is challenged earlier during its rearing periods by sprinting and playing in a group, these capillaries remain in number, but simply shut down during a subsequent rest period. However, the adaptation of bone and joint cartilage is really only transient and stimulated by increased controlled loading during early training. Once the stimulus of training is withdrawn during a rest period, these structures are liable to remodel back to a level suited for yard or kennel turn-out exercise within 4-6 weeks.

The First 4 Weeks: The first 4 weeks of any training program provides an essential foundation period for the full race preparation.   Inadequate conditioning training with step-wise increments to improve musculo-skeletal strength, is likely to lead break-down later in training when the high loading forces of race galloping are imposed onto bones, tendons, joints and the muscles themselves.

Optimum speed can be achieved later in the program, although controlled galloping over 100-150 metres once a week in early in training, does provide the increased loading to stimulate muscle-skeletal adaptation during this important conditioning period.

Week 1: When a greyhound comes into race training, the animal should be wormed out and the quality of diet improved with good quality protein to provide the amino acid building blocks for muscle, blood and bone. Commence on a daily 1-2 km of road work at the walk – this is preferable to total treadmill conditioning which does not provide the interaction with the environment and “bond” with the trainer/handler. Greyhounds are gregarious, true companion animals, which have a sense of ‘bonding’ with humans, in contrast to horses.

Week 2: Walking can be increased to 3 km per day with incline work up and down a 10 degrees slope over 300-400 metres. This exercise will provide a step-wise increase in loading and allow the muscles and bones to adapt without risk of overload. Ideally, the route of walking should be varied to maintain keenness and provide variety.

Week 3: At the start of third week, the greyhound can be introduced to short sprint- ups over 75-100 metres to start with, every alternate day, as a hand slip or person-to-person gallop.

If a trial track is available, these short speed increments should be initially introduced up a straight, and after 7-10 days, slipping from half way around a bend will help to increase metacarpal (shin) loading and the strength of the “shins” on the two front inside metacarpals to help stimulate modeling and calcium deposition to carry the increase in loading at faster speeds. The major cause of ‘shin soreness’ or ‘metacarpal reaction ( ‘quarter bone’ soreness) is a training program which is based on ‘too fast’ too early’ speed conditioning before the bones have time to model and adapt to the high loading forces when galloping.  Faster, heavier greyhounds, galloping around tightly curved tracks with inadequate cross-fall to match the speed of galloping, or on a hard compacted track surface, have an increased risk of ‘shin soreness’ and metacarpal fracture, especially in young, immature greyhounds. This bone modeling process can take up to 6 weeks, but in greyhounds, these increments can be easily incorporated into the first 4 weeks to stimulate a response, so that trials and racing can begin at 5-6 weeks.

Week 4

This is the week during which more speed exercise can be introduced. A greyhound, being a sprint, flight animal , is naturally more “muscle fit” than other sedentary animals. An incremental increase in all-out speed over 150-200 metres, combined with walking to condition the responses, helps provide the foundation for maximising speed. However, once a greyhound is muscle fit and racing regularly, long distance walking on the lead does not improve anaerobic capacity or speed. Walking over long distances during hot or adverse conditions, can sap energy for galloping, lead to dehydration, sore feet and tire the animal, all of which can reduce its willingness to compete and perform in a race.

Greyhounds are best trained by allowing them to gallop freely when they wish in long runs. Ideally, the runs should be curved to the left over 300-400 metres, the direction which all greyhounds turn when racing. This will increase loading on the bones and ‘ shins’ to withstand the forces of high speed cornering. Providing a stable, grassy surface to help cushion the feet when galloping in the runs, helps to develop maximum fitness. Sandy surfaces, unless compacted and wet, can shear and result in high right-sided hip support muscle injuries. Allowing a couple of greyhounds to run together up to the end and back a few times in a long run, 5 metres wide, until they tire and sit down for a pant and rest, is the best way of conditioning for speed. Lead walking on a road or treadmill does not condition speed.