Top 5 Exercises to Strengthen Your Dog’s Back Legs
A dog’s back leg strength plays a critical role in their overall health. Strong leg muscles help aid circulation, thus protecting our dogs’ hearts. They also help protect our dogs from injury and enhance their recovery if they do get injured.
We spoke with expert dog trainer and licensed AKC judge Geralynn Cada to learn more about the importance of exercise in general, the criticality of back leg strengthening in particular, and what pet parents need to know before starting their dogs’ at-home back leg strengthening routine.
The Importance of Exercise for Our Dogs
Giving our dog adequate exercise is crucial for their overall health and happiness.
It helps keep them at a healthy weight, which lowers their risk for diseases like diabetes and cancer. It strengthens their cardiovascular system, which lowers their risk of heart disease. And it provides mental stimulation, which helps alleviate stress and anxiety.
For many of us, “exercise for our dogs” means going for a walk. Walks are great cardiovascular exercise, and it helps our dogs develop and maintain leg strength. However, it can be very beneficial to add additional strengthening exercises that really focus on our dogs’ back legs.
“Back leg strength is especially important for a dog’s health, as it can aid in the recovery of knee and hip issues or surgery. Legs act as a ‘second heart’ in animals, ensuring proper blood flow to and from the heart,” explained Geralynn. “We love our pets so much, we want them to live as long as possible, and so we must protect their hearts as well.”
Geralynn also shared various leg-strengthening exercises available to pet parents and answered all our questions about this particular exercise regimen.
The Top 5 Exercises to Strengthen Your Dog’s Back Legs
Here are some of the best exercises to help your dog strengthen their back legs. Always speak with your veterinarian before beginning a new exercise regimen with your dog. And always take your dog’s breed, age, and any physical limitations into consideration when choosing or modifying a particular exercise.
1. Go for a Walk or Hike
Going for a walk is a classic “you and your dog” exercise - and for good reason! It’s great for heart health and a great place to start building your dog’s back leg strength.
If you can take your dog for a hike, that can really add some extra oomph to the workout. Plus, going for a hike can be great in the mental stimulation department for your dog, as they’ll be exposed to new and unusual sights and sounds. (As mentioned above and in the Q&A below, make sure you are aware of your dog’s limits before engaging in more strenuous activities.)
2. Put Their Paws Up
Having your dog put their front paws up onto a slightly raised target or platform shifts their weight toward their back legs and engages their core. The height of the platform and the number of repetitions can be adjusted to make this work for dogs of any height, age, or physical ability.
If your dog is hesitant to step up onto the target or platform, a low-calorie training treat can be used as an incentive or reward.
You can watch this exercise in action in the video below.
(Here is the embed code. If your website uses the URL to embed videos, then please use https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bS_oDVYyQ8 )
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3. Standing to Lying Down and Back Up Again
Similar to a human squat, this exercise improves your dog’s balance and leg strength. For dogs who need a little extra resistance, you can add a lightly weighted vest to make it more difficult.
This exercise doesn’t take many repetitions to help your dog’s leg strength, so even less mobile dogs can benefit.
4. Use a Balance Disc
Balance discs are a great piece of exercise equipment for your dog’s strength training. Standing on them with all four paws helps your dog learn how to handle unstable conditions and trains the muscles they need to do so.
You can also use the balance disc when doing the “ paws-up” exercise explained above to add some extra challenge and increase their workout.
Another exercise option with a balance disc is to have your dog place their front paws on the balance disc while they pivot their back end around the disc. This strengthens their core as well as the muscles in the legs that allow for quick turning and maneuverability.
Check out how to use the balance disc in the video below.
5. Walk Backwards
Having your dog walk backwards strengthens their legs by forcing them to use muscles in a different way than they usually do. For dogs that excel at this exercise and need to up the difficulty, you can try having them walk backwards up a ramp.
Back Leg Strength Training Q&A with an Expert Dog Trainer
Q: What should pet parents do and know before beginning a strengthening program?
Geralynn Cada: Always check with your veterinarian before you begin any new exercise routine with your pets. Pay attention to your pet’s attitude to make certain you catch any sudden changes in them to avoid injury or overdoing any physical exercise.
“Know thy dog” is my mantra, and you can protect your dog from being pushed too far, too quickly, by stopping when you see sudden changes.
Q: Are there any age limits? That is, can a dog be too young or too old for strengthening exercises?
Geralynn: It’s never too late to start exercising a healthy pet, but it can be too early.
Puppies under one year old have not fully developed their joints yet, so pushing them too hard (like spending long hours hiking, walking, or running) can lead to permanent damage that might be irreparable or very expensive to repair.
Q: If a pet parent is researching how to strengthen their dog’s back legs, what’s the biggest consideration in deciding which exercises to do?
Geralynn: Exercises are breed-specific. Researching what activities suit your dog’s breed is a must.
My Bichons could twirl on their back legs for ten minutes without issues. My border collies cannot. Yet, my border collies are experts at going up the stairs backwards. Both breeds are able to practice on and off a couch or platform easily and effectively.
Most breeds can easily and effectively master a standing-to-lie-down-to-standing move (similar to a squat) with their own body weight or a weighted vest.
Agility equipment, exercise balls to train ball rolling, etc, are great and can be purchased online inexpensively.
Q: What’s a good schedule or duration for strengthening exercises?
Geralynn: Every dog has a different tolerance level, and it’s often breed-specific. If you know your dog’s limits and stay within them, slowly building up strength, you will be safe (unless your dog has a genetic or health issue, of course).
It’s safe to say that exercising at least 30 minutes a day is ideal. I call it “DOG:30.” Set the same time every day, say 7:30 a.m. or 5:30 p.m., to spend 30 minutes exercising your dog's leg strength with their favorite activity to keep their focus.
My 3-year-old border collie, Blu Mustang Sally, loves to fetch a Frisbee. We do this for at least 30 minutes daily and take one day a week off for other activities.
Stretching every day is also important for dogs to keep their joints limber and avoid pulling a muscle, so they won’t have to heal from an injury that could have been avoided. This is especially true for dogs 4 years old and up.
In Conclusion - Let’s Get Moving!
Our dogs’ back leg strength plays a critical role in their heart health and overall well-being. Daily walks, balance disc exercises, walking backwards, target or platform training, and other leg-focused exercises benefit dogs of nearly all ages and abilities. By learning how to strengthen your dog’s back legs, you can not only decrease their risk of injury now but also protect their health in the future.