RAWPETMEDICS TUESDAY LIVE: FEEDING FOR PERFORMANCE

We're live. That was a quick intro. It looks like you're really, really small, Bren. Is there something there? There we go. It's like we're on with Numple Lumpy here.

I'm just—

Hello! Holding the camera. So good evening, everybody. Very welcome to Raw Pet Medics tonight. We are joined here by Dr. Mark Roberts in the bottom right of my screen anyway. It's a bit like a game show here. We've got loads of things up on the screen at the moment. It's It's been such an exciting week. But look, delighted to have Mark here. Thanks for joining us, Mark. Thanks everybody else for coming in. We are Raw Pet Medics. You're going to find us on patreon.com/rawpetmedics. So price of a cup of tea or price of a cup of coffee sustains us through the month, and we deeply appreciate it. Helps us bring on such top quality guests as Mark. He does not come cheap, and so we deeply appreciate that. And so that's it, right out of traps. Bren, did anything exciting happen during your week that you wish to talk about before I talk about that?

Oh, so much has been happening in my week, but I'd love— I always love— we've got a little WhatsApp group and little things fire up from Conor and it sparks off just an amazing shower of interest from a number of guys. So I just think, yeah, curse words usually is in there. But we've— I've finished off the Jane Buxton Um, oh yeah, I think we've, we've both been reading through that. You got halfway.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, it's, it very much is a Catherine Shanahan, um, but it's a review and it's so amazing because you go through all of the books that she quotes from, are there all of the books that we've told you guys out there about over the last 2 years, uh, so you'd sort of probably get the message, but it's a really interesting way of paralleling the human sort of journey through nutrition and looking at this calories in versus calories out myth that goes on and all of the stuff that's there. And actually, you can just totally see that ultra-high-processed food storyline that's gone on on the human side and how it's actually paralleled perfectly in the veterinary world. And it is just this whole, we need to sell our super high-processed carbohydrate-loaded stuff to you guys because that's how we'll make the money to be able to sell more of the stuff to you guys. And actually, when you start to unravel this, you know, all of the myths about how their way is going to be the more ecological way, you know, you've got to start looking at the vegan foods because that's going to be more ecological. All of that myth-busting that goes on in that book is, is sort of like very enlightening. Uh, so if you guys haven't already read it, it's The, um, uh, the great, uh, the VegCon, the VeganCon.

What is this?

Oh, sorry, Jane.

It's the Plant-Based Con. Anyway, the great Plant-Based Con, uh, by Jane Buxton. Jane with a Y in it.

Yeah, yeah, it's really interesting. She knows, and she just sums up things very easy to understand. And, um, I actually hit upon a couple of really cool links to, um, Something similar in that vein, I never would have thought I was going to say this, but you know, as much as the temperatures are going up ever so slightly and carbon's going up, there is some very interesting, um, an awful lot of pants going on in every single field. And when there's drama, there's an awful lot of nonsense as well. And I heard two great, uh, things. I'm going to share from my Facebook page without bogging down what we're talking about tonight because I want to get to Mark. Um, this thing here popped up during the week. This was found on a veterinary wall in Yeovil, Vets for Pets, which was bought out by Pets at Home.

And I'm gonna hide a few things so that we can all see it. So Mark, you're still with us, don't worry, you haven't dropped anywhere, we can hear you, don't swear.

Yeah, yeah. So this is, uh, this was found in Yeovil, Vets for Pets in Yeovil, and it turns out it's on a lot of veterinary walls and it's a poster Pec treats in human terms. It doesn't tell you what those terms are. It's just for a dog and for a human on the right-hand side. So, you know, you could pick on any one of those and be absolutely disgusted, you know. But check out that tin of tuna, guys, is the same as 3.5 cheeseburgers, like for a dog. Isn't that just a disgusting likeness? I mean, clearly, if you're looking at nutrition, they're probably trying to liken to the calories that come off those 3.5 burgers. For a human, but what they're very craftily doing is likening human food products with burgers. A tin of tuna for a dog is the same as 3.5 burgers, which of course it's not, because even if you're eating the same calories from tuna or burgers, you're gonna look very, very different after a month of eating the same calories from those two food sources. It's idiotic, let alone all the other crap that comes with a burger compared to tuna. And there's cheese, the same thing, same as two cheeseburgers. But most despicable is that they're Biscuits, therefore biscuits, that's the same as an apple. That's not related to cheeseburger material. Their stuff that is more cheeseburger than anything else, the junk ultra-processed crap that it is, that's the same as an apple. And those posters are on veterinary walls. I think that Mars Inc., by the way, own that, own those. Vets for Pets is owned by Pets at Home, was bought out by the Linnaeus Group, and Linnaeus Group is Mars Inc. Mars Inc. owns that. So the fact that they let Hill's pet food posters on the wall alone is staggering. But because they're all pushing the same message. Royal Canin have a similar poster, but they use donuts instead of burgers. And I'm thinking, wow, they must think people are absolutely daft. They must think they're stupid that you can get away— they go after the misinformation from us and, you know, evidence-based science and all this, and then they put posters like that on the wall. It destroys all credibility. In Vets for Pets have that on their wall. Shame on them. It's absolute disgrace. With obesity, diabetes epidemic, pancreatitis, cancer, you know, all the stuff that goes with a high-carb diet is a bloody disgrace and it shouldn't be allowed. And that's, that's me round finished.

But really interestingly, they literally— this is another thing that we read in these books that we've been quoting from, and actually it's that nutrition is not calories. Calories are not nutrition. The two things should be seen— look, calories is purely the energy within the food. It is not about how nutritious that food is. So equating as this poster does, purely the calorific value of two items is not what you should be doing. It's not, you know, it isn't about calories in versus calories out as to why you're gaining weight. Okay, there are so many other factors that need to be taken on board. And, you know, this is the same as the, you know, that artificial meat being put together is not going to be the same as a grass-fed cow on the field. You have to realize the difference in nutrients within those.

Yeah.

Without even touching on the ecology of how you get to that point.

Yeah, it's a perfect segue into Robert here. So Mark is the guy who last time we had him on, Mark is the guy that revealed to the rest of us that it's carbohydrates that are to blame for this scourge of pancreatitis. Two-thirds of healthy cats and dogs by mid-age are suffering some form of pancreatitis when they're on the slab. And so we know now, thanks to Mark and his work, that actually it's these high carbohydrate diets. If you want to learn more about that, go back and check out the previous RPM where Mark was a guest and you'll learn more about pancreatitis. But Mark, listen, you are a sled dog guy, and just on the subject of carbs and whatnot, what do you feed your dogs and why?

So for me, I feed my dogs a diet which is essentially more or less sort of 50/50 on a dry matter basis with fat and protein. They might get, it might be 1% or 2%, but I mean it's an incredibly small amount of carbohydrates and they'll come from primarily vegetables and a small amount of fruit, but basically it's a even Stevens protein and fat-based diet.

And that's when they're working, or like, what about when they're at rest? What's the— does it change? Like, when you're—

no, no, I feed them, I feed them it all year round. Um, all I do is decrease the, the amount of food they're fed. Um, and the reason I keep that diet going is because if I reduce the amount of food they're fed, then I can keep them in shape. Um, and what it does— there has been a suggestion that you can switch diets. You can switch them onto a basically a poorer food, if you like, a high-carb food diet, if you like, in the off-season. But there's also been research which has countered that and which I tend to go along with, in that, you know, you want to, you want to be encouraging the usage of, um, basically burning fat all year round. You want to be working the energy system all year round, um, you know, so that they're fully on board with it. You don't want to be switching them over as you start training. So I just, I just keep on it all all year round and then decrease the food and then increase as they start working.

Ah, interesting. Okay, and so what does that food look like? What does— like, you're getting ready for a race, so you're— you first of all, I suppose you've got to tell people what it is you're racing, your types of dogs that you use, and second of all, what does that food look like? How do you carry that on a sled? What are the ingredients? How do you slop it into the bowl?

Well, I mean, I'm— to be honest with you, I'm not typical In fact, I could be wrong, but I don't know of anyone who feeds solely this way, um, this— both the macronutrient composition and also the format in which I feed my dogs. So I, um, if any companies are interested in doing it commercially, a working dog diet, this is a way I think you could tap into this. Um, so I feed my dogs a freeze-dried diet, um, and the reason I do that is, um is for the convenience of working dogs. When I'm out there, the bag's light, I'm not carrying water, and all I need to do is basically when I stop, if I want to feed them, if I've got access to water, great, but normally it's all frozen. Or if you're doing a certain race, you might get to a checkpoint, they might provide you water, or you can use snow and melt it down with an alcohol cooker, and then I can add it to the food. So I'm not carrying you know, meat, if you like, that's got 70% water in it, you know, which is less load on the dogs. So I would just get it either from water at a checkpoint or I'll source it from snow. Then, yeah, I'll just feed them from there, you know. Now that's fundamentally different, and again, I don't know, but I'm pretty sure there's no— I don't know of anyone out there who does it that way. What the quintessential way of doing it is that most people will feed kibble all year round, and this will be the so-called working dog kibbles, which is another point of discussion. But they'll be feeding these working dog kibbles, and then they will substitute that with meat, which from what I can see seems to be around 30-35%, about a third of the diet they're adding meat to that kibble. And they will carry that, they will carry that, they will carry that, that kibble around. Sorry, they will carry the meat round and they will thaw it out in basically like a little cooler on the way round. So they've got the added inconvenience of doing it. Plus they're also feeding a diet which is two-thirds, at least a reasonable amount of carbohydrate content.

And so what happens if you're feeding carbs? I hear about this. You want to explain to people what the difference between using carbs and fat, what this hitting wall type business— do dogs hit walls? Can you give us a bit on that in terms of racing dogs? Sure.

So, um, in many ways, this is not— this concept is the same as if it's a working dog or if a dog that goes for a walk on the block. It's just that the issue becomes more magnified when the dog's working. So, um, a simple way to think upon it is that there's— when you— carbohydrates are stored in the dog's body in the form of something called glycogen. And think of glycogen like, um, the fuel tank, if you like. You know, you get your nozzle from there and you pour it in, you fill it full of fuel. And the dog can only store glycogen— they store carbohydrate in two main locations. The first one is skeletal muscle, and the second one is the liver. And that's the only places it can store it. Um, and there's only a small amount of— you know, you can get— there's only a certain amount you can get in there, and it's not a huge amount. Forget what it is, but it's not a huge amount in terms of calorie energy value that they can store. Now the problem here, if you feed a dog a carbohydrate-based diet, um, then yes, you will fill this glycogen up, but it will start depleting relatively quickly. And as I just mentioned, once that gets low, um, that's when— and it's the same with humans, that's why you hear it with marathoners— they hit the wall. And the only way you can stop that is by taking on more carbohydrates. Um, and then you go for another hour or so, whatever, then you've got to take on more carbohydrates. That's the only way you, you can stop that. Now, if you have a, a dog that's fed a high-fat protein-based diet, then obviously it's not getting a whole lot of glycogen because it's not having a whole lot of carbs. But what tends to happen— and there's been research, published research, that supports this— um, one study found, for example, with two groups of Alaskan Huskies, one was for the high-carbohydrate diet and one was fed a high-fat protein-based diet. And they went out and they did the same distance, came back in, did it again. I think it's about 4 or 5 runs of over a certain distance. And what they found was the dogs that had the high carbohydrate diet, they had much higher glycogen to start off with. The ones that were fed the low carb, high fat diet, they had a moderate amount. But as they went on, the ones on the high carbohydrate diet, they depleted quickly and they ran out of steam. And the ones that were fed them small moderate amounts of, of, so I had a small moderate amount of stored carbohydrate and glycogen on a low-carb diet, it stayed the same. So they never went lower than a sort of a small amount, where the dogs had a high-carb diet, it just went and they fell behind. And this in turn, as you would imagine, affected performance.

Wow, are those dogs hitting the wall?

Well, what happens is, is that, is that, and this kind of goes to what I was saying before about dogs being fed, or me choosing to feed my dogs a high-fat protein— that's probably the best way to describe it, is to call it, you know, a fat protein diet, because it's not necessarily one's high or one's low. They're both about the same on a dry matter basis. And what happens is, is the dogs, when you feed them a high-fat diet, in simple terms, they're used to burning fat. That's what they're burning. The body's designed to— the body's designed inherently to do that anyway, but they are burning fat. And that's what they're good at. So they're firing on all cylinders, they're burning fat. Now if you feed a dog a high carbohydrate diet, yes, you can stop feeding them that, you can switch them over to a high fat diet, but it takes, it takes time for this to happen. Not a whole lot of time, but it does take time. So then what you want to do is, if the problem you've got then is if they're fed carbs, they're reliant on carbs, they're used to using the energy system. So if you, if it falls low, they're not they're not— they can't effectively turn over to fat straight away. So then you have to give them carbs in order to replenish, you know, fill them up, you know. It's not that— it's not that one energy system is being used in isolation, that's just— that's not correct. But a reliance on carbs from a dog that's fed carbs is there, you know. And the only way you can get out of that is to switch them from feeding carbs to take them out and replace them ideally with fat.

Interesting stuff.

So when you you've then— because you've just recently done a great, uh, uh, expedition, I'm going to call it, because that was a race and a half. I mean, how long was that? How many miles did you—

I mean, I did— yeah, I've done, I've done, um, I've raced all— well, not all— I have raced all over the US. This, this, this time I've been over to, um, uh, Duluth, which is in Minnesota. I've been over there, raced all over New England, previously I've been over to the West Coast. This year on the dogs, they've got close to 2,000 miles on them, you know. Um, so it's, it's quite a lot of mileage, you know. So, um, I, I guess, you know, it's, it's, you know, people again would say, well, what relevance has what I'm talking about got to do with my dog that sits next to the fire? And I guess the relevance is, is that yes, it's the extreme end of things what I'm doing, but it does, it kind of helps highlight those issues. It's a bit like, um, it's a bit like if you go to your doctor and you get a stress test because you've got something, that stress test highlights an issue, you know. So what I'm, what I'm doing is highlighting, magnifying, quickening the, the issue, the shortcoming in a diet, if that makes sense.

Yeah, yeah.

So a lot of questions coming in about, is that then a case of in your down season, if you ever have a true down season, I guess you're sort of lowering the, the levels, allowing some recovery from injuries and minor injuries, etc. Are you feeding your dogs differently in that off-season, that recovery season, to how you feed them during your performance seasons?

No, no, exactly the same, right? I mean, I'll give you, I'll give you a different— I'll give you the difference in terms of how much I would feed them, um, when the dogs are really right, because it's you know, it's, it's like any sort of training really with dogs. You just slowly increase the mileage. There's other things you do as well, but in essence, you are, you know, bit by bit increasing the mileage. There's other things involved, involving it, you know, there's more resistance and all the rest of it, but, but in a sense, that's the gist of it. You just increase the mileage. But when they're at the peak of the training, they are probably going through— in freeze-dried cups, they're probably going through about, um, God, like, some will go through 11 to 13 cups a day of freeze-dried food. Um, so that's a lot of— like, yeah, they'll go for like about— I've worked it out once, I think it's about 6,000-7,000 calories they're going through a day.

So is the race requirements that that's packed with you on the race, or do you have feed stations that you can top up from with support vehicles, etc.?

Yeah, that's, that's a good question. It depends on the race. Um, so some will, um, you'll have to carry it with you, and some you'll have, you, you'll put, um, drop bags that will go to a checkpoint and they'll be, you know, your stuff will be there. Just, it depends on the race. Some you have to, some you have to carry some things and not others. It just depends on the race. But, um, and that's where, that, that's where, um, to be honest with you, um, in all— and that's one of the reasons why we moved. Well, actually, the main reason we moved to the US from New Zealand— obviously I'm originally from the UK, but I moved to New Zealand, I was there for nearly 20 years, and then moved over here, um, was because, you know, working dog nutrition and just dog nutrition in general is what my PhD was in. And as we all know, it's great to do that stuff, and I've been, I've been implementing that nutrition because I raced dogs in New Zealand for that time as well. But coming over here, it's like on another level, you know, like it's another level even higher up than that. And I thought, you know what, now's the time to use my academic research knowledge. But as we all know, that's great to have that knowledge, but getting out and using it in the field is a different thing. You learn— one thing I've learned over too many years, one thing I've learned over too many years of being in university is that you can't beat getting out there and getting your hands dirty and trying it out and seeing what works and what doesn't, you know.

Yeah, yeah, totally. Like, and in relation to that, in relation to what you're doing at the moment, you're a bit weird, Mark, aren't you? Why are you a novice? So yeah, it depends on where is he going with this one. Just keep it dog related. So like, why is it that you are— what makes your team so interesting? What's different about you?

Well, it's not just me. There's not— I would say in the whole of North America, there's only a very small amount, probably, I don't know, 5 or 6. There might be a few more, but it's— there's very, very few people who race Siberian Huskies. Um, well, what the other ones are called Alaskan Huskies. So, um, basically what happened, I don't know, 30, 40, maybe more than that years ago, all the races were just Siberian Huskies. And then some— someone realized if you've got these Siberian Huskies and you cross them with, um, hounds, pointers, those kind of things, you end up with a bigger dog that is far superior in terms of speed. I mean, they're just vastly, vastly better runners than Siberian Huskies.

Okay.

Um, now the, the only— the downside to that is that because you, you water down that true Arctic breed, they tend to get more issues with, um the pads will break up on the snow easier, you know. They have less furry coats, which is good when they're working because it keeps them cold, but if they stop, they have to have jackets. So there's issues of, you know, around them being quicker that you compromise because you sort of, you know, you flush out a certain amount of that true Arctic breed. But you cannot deny that they are like massively, massively quicker. I mean, you just, you just cannot argue it, you know. I mean, you, you'll go out you'll go out, it doesn't matter if it's a training run or a race, you know, you're going to be out 30, 40% more time on the trails than what these guys are. I mean, it's— and in all fairness, you know, in all fairness, when you see these dogs and how quick they are, you know, you can't help but, um, you know, just be impressed that humans have managed to sort of mix dogs and get this absolute beast of a runner. I mean, it's just impressive that we've been able to do that. I mean, humans have a lot of faults, but In terms of making dogs fit for purpose, you know, certainly with sled dogs, they've done, they've done a great job of it.

That's interesting.

Any benefits from, you know, between the sort of shorter sprint races and, and short-term events to the long endurance events? Are you seeing any differences between them?

Yeah, because I've done all that as well. I've done all this short, I've done the mid, and now I'm obviously into the long distance. I would say if you're talking just a few, few mile run, that they were still— the good ones will still beat you. But I've beaten, I've beaten Alaskan Huskies over a few miles. You know, the good ones will still beat me, but the average ones, I'll beat them. You know, so, uh, it's— you'll get away with it more so over a few miles, but as that distance gets further and further, um, it seems to get bigger. You know, now in terms of long distance, in terms of long distance, and this is, this is something that I'm still obviously just getting into, and we'll see next year and we'll see the year after how this goes. But it might well be that, um, the more I, you know, because this is the thing, I've only been here for 4 years and I bought it when I came over. I had 10 dogs and they were all pretty much in retirement. So I've just started to— then we had COVID, so I've, you know, this team is really just coming through. They're only sort of half my team that ran that 2,000 miles this year, they were under 2 years of age. It was the first season of running, you know. So, um, yeah, so it's a very young team and You know, the normal sort of rule of thumb is certainly with Siberians is they're not— they don't really mature physically and mentally into long-distance running until they're sort of 3 or 4 years of age. So, um, but it may well be, and we shall see, we shall see if this is true, um, that if, you know, a long, long race, you know, sort of 250, 300 miles plus, it may well be that the nutrition plays a part, and it may well be which I'm sure this will be the case, dog welfare and looking after them becomes more of a, you know, more of a factor. Yeah, you know, I don't think it's going to change the result, but what it might do, it might, it might be at the back of the field, there might be a little bit closer than, you know, a chasm it is at shorter races.

Yeah, I, I saw there was an interesting study there. I can't remember who did it, but they had— they ran huskies on— not sure which type— on high, medium, and low carbohydrate diets. And they found that the huskies after one sled season that ran on the high carbohydrate diets had the most injuries, and the ones on the high protein diets had the least injuries. So that does tally in with the longer distance of, listen, you, you don't want these guys on high carbohydrate diets.

Yeah, and that's the other thing as well, is that— and this is a non-nutritional thing— but because those dogs are just so super quick, you're like, so crazy fast, they are more prone to injuries because they're just going faster. You know, they'll do wrist in and they'll do shoulder injuries in because they just are so quick. I mean, the other thing as well is it's not just the physical attributes they have, they are just— their brains are just designed to run. So with a Siberian Husky, they want to run, but there's times when they, you know, they start getting tired. You've got to use a lot of, um, sort of strategies to keep them wanting to run, you know, because if they don't want to run you can't make a dog run, you know. If you want to get off and beat— any belief that you can get off and beat a dog and make it run, it's not going to do it. It just won't do it. It'll just lie down and refuse to go, you know. Um, so you've got to use a lot of— it's— so for me, it's, it's— for me, I get this question a lot, and it's a fair question, is why not go for a faster dog? I'm going to be out on the trails, and it's not even a race, you know. If you imagine I'm going out for— my God, I don't know how many hours I'm out in winter, but I'm out. I'm just— feels like I'm constantly outside, you know. If you imagine that 30, 40— 30— my time could be saved by 30, 40% and be at home with my family or doing more work. That's a big saving, isn't it? You know what I mean?

Yeah, it depends if you want to be out in the woods. Yeah, sometimes, sometimes it's nice to be out and about.

It is, it is, it is, but not, not for like 30, 40 hours a week or whatever.

Yeah, in, in, in minus 30, 40.

I mean, how has that weather affected you? Because it's a real cold blast, um, you know, over New Year, wasn't it? So what's— how, how did that affect you guys?

Um, again, it's, um, I mean, that's— I'll, I'll answer that question. I'll answer that question from a sort of— I don't know, using a bit of— how can I put it? Like, for me, I, I grew up in England. I grew up in Manchester, you know. I was in the, I was in the, the Army for quite a few years.

I never would have guessed.

But then, but then when I left, like, I decided I wanted to go and experience lots of different things, you know. So then I did my degree in the UK and I went to New Zealand, did my postgrad stay there, and then my PhD, all that kind of stuff. And then I was like, you know what, and I've been racing the dogs there, like I said, for years, and I wanted a different, you know, I wanted to change. So then we moved to the States and we spent 2 years in, of all places, Northern Nevada, in a place called Reno, which you'd think would be hot, and it was hot in summer but it got cold and we had a lot of snow. We were sort of 6,000, 6,500 feet. We're on the, on the high desert. And I trained and raced the dogs all over, um, you know, the Sierra Nevadas up into, um, California, and then Oregon and the Cascade Mountains, and then further up from there. I, I wanted to experience that, you know. I want to go through life and experience those things, you know. And then I wanted more. I wanted— even I was like, oh no, I want more than this. So then You know, I looked, I researched and found New Hampshire was great for snow and the weather was cold in winter. So then I drove the dogs all the way across the country and moved here, you know. Um, so for me, patient wife.

What a patient wife you must have.

I mean, bloody hell.

Does she like dogs?

When I met her, she wanted— she actually did want to meet the dogs the first day I met her, you know.

Yeah, that's cool.

I was, I was, I was trying to, I was trying to I was trying to impress her by not being covered in dog hair and muck, you know, the dogs. Yeah, which was weird because then not just that, not just that they have a load of dogs, but as it's kind of the norm for me, I live remotely, so I had to drive into the middle of nowhere to show her these dogs. Yeah, well, the cold, the cold is, is a challenge. There's no two ways about it. I mean, it's, um, You know, when it's, you know, like anyway, this whole global warming thing's happening, you know, and it's definitely getting warmer, but when it's cold, it is cold, you know. I mean, it's, um, you know, I got, I got, um, you know, my ends of my fingers got pretty severe frostnip and now to pick them off and they came off and, you know, and it's, you know, it's, you know, you've got, you know, like when it's really, when it's really cold, you know, like it gets up it gets that cold that my eyelashes will get so full of ice that every 3 or 4 minutes I have to wipe because I can't see where I'm going, you know. It's, it's, it's, you know, everything just— and everything is— when it's so cold, it gets dry. So, and that's the other problem. And then again, it's, you know, these are things that you learn, is that I've been out and took fluid with me, and because it's so cold and dry, I'm just so thirsty, you know, and I'm working the dogs, and then I'll go for my bottle and it's just completely frozen, you know. And I, I've had everything freeze so much I've been looking at snow thinking, man, I'm gonna have to just stop and just put my head in the snow and just try and eat it. Yeah.

But then did the army not teach you to wear your CamelBak inside your—

uh, yeah, you know what, even that doesn't work.

Thermals?

Yeah, even that doesn't work. No, no, it worked to a degree. It worked to a degree, but, um, it's still—

but then the pipe freezes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. What I did, what I did, I found a way around it. I got some, you know, like, um, insulation stuff for your house, the, the silver foam insulation. I got that. Yeah, yeah. And I put a load of, um, hand warmers in there with bottles and made it tight, and then that worked.

Yeah, I, uh, I, I tried to, I tried to impress you with this story before, Mark, but it didn't work. I was in, uh, up the top of Norway in the Arctic but just inside the Arctic Circle. But I mean, it was proper windswept cold. We were doing husky sled riding, and when we got there, I got those husky mixes because I was expecting these beautiful Siberian huskies, Lord of the Rings style. I'm sitting on a throne being dragged through the snow. But like, that's your lead dog there, Lucky. You've got 5. They weren't big impressive dogs, but they looked like— and Lucky just stares at me as if like, you know, you lazy pig, you better run. And if you didn't run with this sled they would, Lucky would turn around and he'd look at you and he'd be like, get off the sled, we're going up a hill and start pushing. And so you would push so hard, the output of energy on those, and this is supposed to be like, you know, this is a guide dog, raise some money and go across the north. And it was, you know, 2 weeks with the Norwegian SAS, that's what real men look like. You should have seen them. They were just these absolute huge beasts and walking around in the nip to get into the jacuzzi or into the sauna that they built with their hands, you know, proper men. And I'm just like freezing, getting frostbite, trying to run from the hot shower. But anyway, I used to sweat so much. You have these hats on and all these proper Arctic gear, but the hat would freeze to your head. And so you could take your hat off and it would just be frozen solid and you'd spin it around to put it back on your head and off you go again. But like you were saying, with these sides, with the sidebeards, you are working so, so hard. Like you said that your suit was just wet and I'm thinking that is not a good thing, surely.

No, it's not. And I think that in all honesty, that's something that I'm reflecting upon now that we're finished. For next year round, um, you know, and I'm gonna try and modify some of the training with the dogs. I also need some bigger males to put into the group because, um, in all fairness, I just can't— I can't go— I can't do that. It's just, it's just, you know, you're just in the point of absolute exhaustion, you know.

Why don't you have all big males? Why not have a lot?

Yeah, a lot. Yeah, yeah, most do. Most do. Most have— they're the odd female, you know, or big female, and that's And again, that's something that, you know, like, you know, I've, I've got into this long distance thing and I'm realizing that I need more. And even my kennel size is, is 20 dogs, whatever it is, but it's still, it's still small, you know, like a handful of those in retirement, you know, some are still pups, you know. So I don't really have a huge pool to actually choose from. So it's still, it's still, I'm still in that process of modifying it. But, but yeah, I mean, there's, there's times I've got there and it's just been like, I've been so exhausted I can barely I can barely go on, you know. Um, you know, it's, it's just, um, and some of these hills, you have to understand that, um, like when I was in New Zealand, you know, you do a race that would be a few miles and people would make a big deal that there was a hill you'd climb for sort of 15 minutes or something, you know. Like there's hills you do with this in these races, they just, they go on for hours. And then what makes it worse is for some god knows reason, it defies logic, you don't go down at the end. It just plows out at the top. It just doesn't seem to go down. What?

You don't even get the glory of going down the hill?

I don't know how that's possible. It must be such a small— it must be such a small going down decrease that you actually don't notice it. I don't know what it is. But the point— but, you know, like, I've been— I've been so tired going up these hills. I've just been like, I can't do this, you know. And you have— and then, and then it's, um, And honestly, as well, with the Alaskans, they'll come past and they might be scooting with a leg a little bit, but man, it's just not— it's nowhere near the workload.

Oh, that's hard. But why? Like, I think most normal people listening to this, Mark, are probably thinking, why? Why? I mean, you are choosing a team that you are not going to win with this team. I mean, you're lucky to finish the race, and these longer races, it's 50/50 if you're going to finish the race. Yeah, pushing 4-mile hills in -30 with dogs that don't run as fast as everybody else's. Why are you doing that? Could you not just go for like a normal person and go home and watch some TV? What are you doing?

It is tempting. It does cross my mind. I think because here's the thing, I think if I actually did have Alaskans, then my, my viewpoint would change and it'd be, well, maybe I can place in the top 3, you know, and then, then that would become the stress, you know. Um, but for me, it's— for me, the issue is can I get around, you know, can I do this and can I get my dogs around safely um, in good condition and being happy. And that's— and in all honesty, like, I've done races where I finished races, I've done races where I haven't finished races, but the one thing all the vet teams at every single checkpoint have said is that your dogs— these are their words, not mine— your dogs come in and look happy and healthy. And, you know, they're fine when they come in, they look really good dogs, you know. So for me, I, and I guess that's your— that's— that it's a good thing, but it's a highly stressful thing, is when you're out with a huge bunch of animals and you, you really are sometimes, you know, you're a long way from anything, um, it's you and them. I mean, granted, if something happens, if it's a race, at some point they're going to realize you're not coming to a checkpoint. And nowadays they have GPS on your sleds. It's probably more stressful when I'm training on my own, actually, because there isn't any of that. But you are, you are, um, you know, you're responsible for those dogs, like, and that's it, you know. You've got to, you've got to look at them all. You've got to look at the way they're moving, the gait, um, you know, everything about them, the way they sort of are, and pick up on, is this dog— is something slightly off with this dog, you know? And then if there is an issue, you've got to deal with it, you know. You've got to deal with that effectively, as you know. It's, it's a bit like in the army, you're the sergeant of the soldiers, you know, and you've got to look after them, you know. And there's no— yes, someone will get to you in the end, but it is you, you know. It, you know, you don't really think that far ahead. You just know that those dogs are your responsibility to look after, you know, and, and get to the next point. And then, and then that's the other thing, because I've had this in races, you know, I had it with a Can-Am. I came into the checkpoint and I was still fine, like I was still ready to go, but I had a couple of dogs that were, you know, just weren't right. And I thought, you know what, it's not a— it's got nothing to do with me, it's about what's right for the whole, the whole team, you know. Um, you know, see, it's, it's, it's— I kind of like the fact that you've got to make the right decision, you've got to make decisions, and sometimes it's for But sometimes it's always for the dogs, you know, but it's also for me because if I get too tired and I can't work effectively as the boss, then it's all going to fall apart, you know. Um, so I guess, I guess that's what— that's a challenge I like rather than— and I'm not saying that these faster teams, these Alaskans, don't have issues. Of course they do. Um, I just think it's— there's more of them and the slow speed just makes it more challenging as well.

Yeah, yeah, interesting.

So could I ask, yeah, there's been a common question being asked, well, there's been a couple, we'll probably get to some of them even through into Patreon as well, but one of the ones that sort of came up earlier was exercising, especially when you're building to performance, younger dogs. So those dogs that are maybe just about getting to skeletal maturity. So maybe for, I don't know what it is for Siberian Huskies, but maybe it's around about the sort of 12 to 18 months, getting into 2 years. What's your viewpoint? I know what my viewpoint is, but I would really like to understand your viewpoint and your experience of at what point do you feel encouraging slightly more strenuous exercise is a good benefit for their future health versus a risk of injury or causing some deformity, etc., for their growth plates? Yeah, where do you feel you rest on that?

I mean, you're right, you're right. Obviously the size of the dog, you know, Malamutes for example, you know, they're, they're going to be longer, you know, in terms of when you get them doing a lot of mileage and say Siberians. Um, but for me, um, I find once they're, once they're about 1 year of age, you know, they're pretty much in that adult sort of state then. Um, And it would depend, and this is a tricky one as well, is that I always start on the 1st of September, start doing training. You know, if I've got a dog that say isn't going to be 1 until the 1st of January, for argument's sake, um, then I'll leave that dog to the following year. It's always hard because you leave it, you know, then the dog's going to be, you know, a year and a half or whatever, you know, a year and 8 months by the time you start. But for me, I want them to be— I want them to be warm, you know. I mean, there might be a week or two either side of this, but I want them to be warm when we start. And I think the thing there is you're not really getting to a lot of mileage in towards the end of the year, and by then you've started to lay down that muscle tissue, you know, you've started to strengthen those tendons, you've started to do all that, you know. And I don't see a problem then why they can't get into that. Um, I still think that I don't have a problem doing long distance if you adopt that approach, in my opinion. But I still— and I still do, and I still don't think you're going to get any issues down the track. But like I mentioned before, I still think that the real bedding down of the physical strength and the mental strength will still take 2 or 3 years. It just will. It's a bit like, you know, I mean, I've done— I've done a few ultra marathons in my time, and I've seen some gnarly In fact, I remember very distinctly doing one and some gnarly old guy who was probably nearly 70 just came cruising past me up this hill. Yeah, you know. Yeah. As he came past me, as he came past me, he went, good morning. I can just carry on. I think, I think, I think we've got it, you know. I think, I think it's one thing having the strength to do something, but that real sort of bedding down of that strength you know, it's like bodybuilders, strength people, you know, they can be in the prime in the 40s. It takes time to really do that, you know. Yeah. Um, it doesn't mean they can't do it when they're the one or two, but I think for a sibe anyway, it takes 2 or 3 years of doing it before you really are— you've got that sort of musculature that you want, you've got the strength, they're mentally in tune. Because that's a big thing, you know, to take a dog out, you know, like that last one was like 67 miles the first leg. 67 miles one leg. You know, just hills and hills and hills and hills and hills and hills, you know. That's a long time, you know. You've got to remember, like, these races that we're doing— I mean, like I said, I'm from Manchester— they're longer than going from Manchester to London, you know. This is a long race, and that's not even on— that's not good on a motorway. That's up and down hills and everything, crossing lakes, everything, you know.

Yeah, so that's really interesting because, I mean, from— so would you advocate that that's transferable to our human sports personalities, that actually we as a species, as a nation, as— it's not just a UK thing either, it's, you know, across the world. Yeah, we're forcing some of these young kids into high performance. I mean, some of the athletes that we're talking about, I mean, you'll talk about footballers going through when they're still in their mid-teens, you know, to academies. You'll talk about rugby players doing a similar thing. You'll talk about some of the gymnasts, I mean, being yet turning 10 and being asked to do some really athletic, um, events. Yeah. Are we thinking that actually that's wrong? We should be allowing them to mature? Have they got it wrong on the human side, or yeah, are we being overly cautious on the canine side?

Um, I, I think that the human side is an interesting one. It's not my area of expertise, but But I think, in my view, I think that up until the age of— it's hard to say, isn't it? And certainly the age of 18, maybe 16, you know, we should be encouraging, we should be developing. But I don't believe the really high-intense stuff should be happening until there's a certain level of what's deemed adulthood, you know. Um, like, I, I, I, I, I, I— and it's, it's hard. If you take, for example, doing a marathon, you know, Is a kid— is a kid that goes up and slowly builds up and builds up and builds up and hits 18, 19, does a marathon, is that fine? I would say it's fine. But is it fine for no one to have any training and go out and do a marathon? No. And, and working the way towards the goal rather than suddenly doing a huge amount. But yeah, I do think we have to be careful in terms of, um, like when I was in the army, when the army was a classic one because you'd get, you know, you had to be 18 to join, um, but you'd have so many kids that had never done any training and there was no progression, not then anyway, there probably is now. It was literally get your boots on. I remember the very first day they gave us our boots, they took us down the lake, they got us in the lake so the leather boots molded down your feet, and you were in boots, you were in boots the whole time, that was it. Their own shoes, you know, being trainers. And now it's changed that because now, you know, you spend a certain amount of time in trainers and then you go half in trainers, half in boots. So I guess my point is that yes, I think that we are in some ways it is too young, but I also think we should do it in a gradual way as well.

Yeah. Can you do drugs? Is there any drug testing being done on people pushing sleds? I imagine there's prize money for the bigger races. And so the fitter you are, the more— like, you know, EPO and whatnot. Is there any drug testing of dogs and humans and that sort of thing? What supplements can you use to boost?

There is in dogs. They do testing dogs. I'm not aware of anything in humans. But I mean, you know, some of these— I mean, that's— I mean, that's another point you just mentioned there, is that, you know, some of these races, you know, first prize will be um, you know, they'll get a few grand, you know, they get a few thousand dollars, you know. Um, um, I actually, um, I actually did a stage race, my last race, um, a few weeks ago, and I, I, it was kind of funny because that's the first time I've ever got money. I got a check for $125. That's the first time I've ever got it. I know I actually didn't cash it and I actually was thinking again, it's drained just for a laugh. I got some money, you know. Yeah, yeah, totally. But no, I mean, I know, I know. But I mean, but it's, it's, it is, it is fair to say, I guess, if you are in, you know, in the run, running, and you're $5,000, I mean, that's, that's a reasonable chunk of change, isn't it? You know, you know.

Yeah.

Um, so yeah, can you get sponsored, Mark?

Can you get sponsored? So you're feeding this freeze-dried food, like, I mean, why wouldn't you go to that company and stick their name on your back and say, look, I'm talking about this, Mark. I'm giving you business ideas here, Mark.

Yeah, I know, I know, I know. Well, actually, that's, that's a good point, is that one thing I actually spread the word on this is one thing I would like to do is to do more, to do more research on working dogs. So any companies that are in that have meat-based diets that are interested in getting involved with research, let me know, you know, because I've got a whole host of areas that I want to look into if they want to be involved in that, and, and I'm happy to do that. You know, pay me for my troubles, you know, pay me for my trouble for doing it. And we can— I can do a report, I can do record video, they can come over, you know, I don't know, whatever they want to do. Because that's, that's, that's for me now where I'm at now.

All of a sudden there's a queue of people at the airport. We'll go over to New Hampshire.

That's a good idea. That is a good idea.

Yeah, I mean, and that's, and that's— we haven't got time for it today, but, you know, I thought I'll throw a few things out there, you know, keep ketosis. Let's measure the level of ketones. Let's look at blood glucose. Let's look, let's look at hydration, how well, how better dogs are hydrated. Yeah, you know, whenever I've gone into checkpoints and the vets have checked my dogs, they've already said these dogs are incredibly hydrated. Let's look into that, you know. How does that affect kidneys? You know, how does that affect the kidneys? There's all sorts of stuff. Let's measure, you know, there's all, there's a few things we have thrown out there.

Yeah, well, what's really interesting, because so many people out there will have seen working dog in the stores, okay, on raw food. And that's actually all about a VAT thing. If they put, uh, working dog on those packages, there is no performance element in those foods whatsoever. It is literally because they're trying to avoid the VAT, man.

Yeah, is that right?

Please don't get, you know, the illusion that in the UK working dog means anything other than it's VAT-free. And actually, some of those stores can get inspected, and if they are not checking that they are supplying to working dogs, they can actually get fined for avoiding tax.

I think Britain's the only country in the world that has a 0%— that I know of so far, certainly in Europe and States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand— it's the only place that has a 0% tax bracket for working dogs. I think most other countries have a reduced rate for greyhounds. Ireland is 11% for— I didn't know, but you have to buy 30 kilos at a time and all this sort of stuff. But in, in the UK, in Britain, so that's why you don't really see raw dog food with a picture of a Chihuahua on the front of it, because a Chihuahua is not a working dog. So you get Spaniels and Labradors and all sorts of— yeah, isn't it mad?

So yeah, I do, I do generally think, um, I mean, the problem with working dogs, I mean, it depends on the size of the kennel. Like, if it's a huge kennel it's going to be hard to afford, you know, a product like that. But I do believe that, yeah, that I do believe that, um, you know, um, because not— there's not many people who have big teams now. It's kind of getting harder and harder, you know. You've got to, you've got to look after these dogs all year round, you've got all the associated costs, etc. But I do think that, um, a good freeze-dried diet of that sort of composition I've mentioned— and I would actually— this is another area I want to look into I want to tweak some of the electrolytes in that product, um, and I also want to add more, um, N3s. I want to add more, um, DHA, EPA in there as well. I want to change that as well. You know, this is something I want to develop. I do think the product like that would, would go really well, um, in a working dog community. And by working—

that is, that is my point. That is my point, that actually there is a huge window of opportunity there for a true working dog, right? A true performance.

Uh, guys, we've got to stop. This is just— we're giving away our best ideas here. This is just— everybody forget what you've heard. We're drinking. This is—

so, but if you want to know more from Mark, um, he's agreed, he's got a great presentation he's going to record. We're going to pop that up on Patreon so that you guys, you know, beginning next week can have a look at that. Um, if you want to join us for a little bit of after show, uh, with Mark, then please do join us on patreon.com/rawpet We're going to switch over before Dr. Judy gets annoyed that we're eating into her segue. So from that side of things, it's been great to see all of the comments, and thank you so much, Mark, for joining us from the middle of nowhere. Everybody's been commenting about you look like you've just landed your helicopter.

Yeah, yeah. Great. So, so interesting, Mark. Just so, so interesting. There's a brain I like picking, so it's just a really interesting kind of story. So thanks for that, appreciate it. Thanks so much, guys, for coming along.

So we're gonna stay on. Yeah, we're gonna stay on. If you want to join us over on Patreon, you'll find, uh, the further recording in about an hour or so.

Cool. Cheerio.

Good to see you all, guys.