# Daily exercise distribution



## Frida010 (Apr 24, 2020)

I have noticed that when I take my V (14 months old) out in the morning / around noon for a long (2,5H) run / bike (incl. slow sniffing and fast running pace she recharges faster than I expect. Yes, for the first hours she crashes on the couch. But around dinnertime she’s fully recharged, gets restless and starts to demand playtime. 

When I take her out for exercise more than once, let’s say for 1H running twice a day - she usually takes it very easy during the rest of the day.

Blowing all their energy out in the morning doesn’t really seem to work for us.

So I was wondering, how do you distribute daily exercise? How fast does your V recharge? What works best for you?


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## Dan_A (Jan 19, 2021)

I've noticed similar behavior. When I try to expend Ellie's energy with one 1-1.5hr offleash hike in the morning, sometime around 3pm she starts looking for more. When we split it up with my wife taking her on a short 20-30 min walk mid-morning, then I take her on a 1hr+ offleash hike around 1 or 2pm, that tends to keep her content the rest of the day for the most part. It may be timing, or perhaps the mere act of having two outings versus 1 does the trick. It could be that splitting it into two activities also exercises the mental stimulation bucket, or it just resets some crazy V timer!


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## [email protected] (Feb 24, 2020)

Hi there!

Our morning playtime is generally one hour, sometimes 1h:30. Then, he becomes restless around 6-7 pm. Now, during summer, I take him out for a quick 30 minute fetch and a short walk to burn off some steam and then he goes out again at 9:30 - 10 pm for another 1 hour walk and play (depending on his mood). The evening walk may vary - it may be as above, or we may go to the lake which means 30-40 minutes swim and a 30-40 minutes walk, sometimes more. In autumn/spring and winter we go out at 6-6:30 pm for 1 hour and a half (or a bit earlier if it's a particularly cold day). 

I have noticed that my pup is more active in the afternoon - he loooooves to sleep in the morning. During colder days, when we are not bound by either weather or office hours to go out early, he will sleep until noon. We have generally divided our 2:30 - 3 hours/day in 2-3 sessions. As you say, I feel that no matter how long or intense our morning play is, it's like he's carrying a pocket watch. At 6 pm he starts fussing around and at 7 he really really wants to go out (irrespective of the time we went out in the morning, or the length/intensity of exercise). Therefore, we go out for fun and runs at least twice every day (now we go 3 times, because it is very hot and at 7 pm it's still over 90 degrees, so he cannot run/play much). 

For us the distribution works better because I think he gets bored, and I understand. There is not much he can do indoors and is looking forward to meeting his friends, playing and running.


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## Frida010 (Apr 24, 2020)

Really nice to hear similar stories! Now that our V’s (all same age) fall into an adult and steady scedule I guess we’re all trying to figure out the right way to keep our dogs relaxed and well exercised.

On weekdays without doggy daycare Fred also snoozes until noon. We only take her out for to toilet in the morning and then she just snoozes the rest of the morning. I can take her out during lunch time for an hour, which normally is the first exercise she gets. During weekdays our schedule is also more distributed, which works nicely. 

However I hoped that in the weekends I could also do with a very long and active morning exercise (and then have the rest of the day and evening to myself) but I’ve noticed she is fully recharged just around the time we start to relax. Although I have to say, since I’m pregnant, sometimes I just can’t give her that extra evening round and if I ignore her eventually she falls asleep anyway.

Funny to hear similar stories. Athletic dogs for sure.


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