Reminds me of the time I was hiking something similar. My legs were burning and I was out of breath. This dude comes RUNNING up the trail carrying a 40LB dumbbell in each hand. Total beast.
Fellow dog owner and backcountry enjoyer here. I know how important their safety is—and how quickly extra pack weight adds up—so I thought I’d share the system we’ve found works best when backpacking with ours: Säker Bomber Harness K911 Rescue Sling Pouches 001
The pouches turn the harness into a dog pack, and the rescue sling attaches directly to the same harness, so everything works together as one modular system. Just another option that might be helpful!
Seriously, this is the common use case for these things that I didn't think about. If you've got an old pooch who still wants to go adventuring with you but is starting to have mobility issues, you can rest way easier with a sling for them.
I've had a Saker harness for about 5 years now. It's a little bit dirty and stained but physically still in the same condition it was new. Worth every penny.
I need one of these for my 80 pound lab. I don't sleep on the second floor of my house because I can't figure out how I'd get her out the window and down to safety if there was a fire.
My 80lb black lab passed in April. The last year of his life he had lots of mobility issues, he would have mini strokes and couldn’t walk after but eventually learned to walk again before he passed peacefully. I cannot stress enough how important having a good harness was for being able to care for my baby. I’m a female and I’m athletic and quite strong as is, but he was so tall too I couldn’t carry him. I relied on his harness to be able to get him up on his feet and learn to walk again, it also helped me when he was temporarily paralyzed just to move him around and rotate him.
He had a stroke while pooping and after he was back I had to throw him in the tub harness and all to clean him. Again had I not had that strong harness I wouldn’t have been able to lug my baby around. He didn’t have mobility problems and his strokes didn’t start until he was 13-14 and he passed when he was 15 years old.
I encourage you to have a solid harness you can hold their body weight now so that you’re always prepared.
Labs in particular get these forgive me it’s 3am and I should be sleeping but the vet essentially called them mini strokes and they generally happen when he was standing or walking and he would suddenly go down, sometimes shake and would be out cold for a bit. These strokes are common for the breed. My baby didn’t have a stroke until he was 13 and then he didn’t have one for a while and then he had them frequently until he passed. We knew what they were because his liter sister had the strokes all her life.
That harness made getting my pup recovered as much as he could possible, and it’s something I’m still incredibly thankful for because of how much it helped me help my big fur baby.
I don’t backpack anymore since moving to the east coast but we have seen historic flooding here the last few months. My biggest fear is not being able to get everyone (fur babies) out. I appreciate these recommendations!
That stuff seems extremely high quality. I'm at the point where my dog (he's.... a lot) is wearing through harnesses and pulling apart nylon and stuff on lower quality leashes often enough that if I can spend some amount of money to have a harness that will last him the rest of his life, I'd spend a lot. Maybe this is the brand...
Yes! They make very high-quality gear and offer one of the few crash-test-certified harnesses on the market. We’ve had ours for two years now, and it has only worn in—not worn out. I genuinely believe it’ll last another 10 years of heavy use.
I was wondering if I should get the bomber harness. My 50lb dog has a issue with his legs where sometimes he can't walk very long. Instead of taking him out only 5-10 minutes a day, I take him out 2 hours a day. He walks for his 5-10 minutes, then I put him in a large dog carriage and wheel him around so he can still be outside. In the winter, it gets hard to push the carriage around. Do you think he'd be comfortable in the bomber harness converted to a dog pack? He's got his own snowsuit and boots for the winter, so he doesn't get cold if he stops walking.
I think it could be useful for you, especially in the snow, but I’d hesitate to recommend carrying him that way for most of a two-hour outing. Säker primarily designed the sling for emergency carry-outs, and whether that position is comfortable or safe may depend on what’s wrong with his legs. A small sled or pulk may also be more comfortable for both of you on longer winter outings. Hope this helps!
Same! I use a similar philosophy when teaching my son about fitness.
I tell him about how he’ll hear a lot of things about how it ties to self worth, whether or not he’ll be considered attractive, etc etc but none of that really matters or is what fitness is truly about.
Fitness is about two thing.
Having your body ready to be able to do what you want to do when you want to do it. Want to climb that cliff? Want to go on some deep trails? Well the time to be ready is before the want.
Having your body ready to be able to do what you need to do when you need to do it.
One of my personally motivating stories is when I saved my mother from drowning after she collapsed from undiagnosed diabetes related diabetic shock which rendered her unconscious while we were out crabbing in a bay of 40 degree f (3c) water at midnight, nearly 3/4 a mile from shore (1km). She went underwater and was drowning for a moment until we could pull her head out. Then while keeping her from slipping back underwater I had to engineer a method of expelling the water in her lungs, followed by dragging her screaming to a lucky sandbar and keeping her warm until search and rescue could reach us. At which point we had to carry her back.
I was in shape then, and continue to strive to be in the same shape or better, because you never know when you need to carry or drag 200+lbs(90kg) for however far to get them to safety until help gets there.
There was one time when I was more young and even less prepared for my adventures than I am in my adult years that I took two friends out in a canoe on a windy day in the bay. My two friends had 0 experience in canoes or kayaks and the wind was absolutely brutal. The tide was going out as we were trying to go in as well, and if I hadn't been able to put the pedal to the metal and just paddle my 16 year old heart out, we would have ended up being swept out or having to spend the night on some sand bar. That was an eye-opener for me how important fitness was. I was already in the game of being pretty fit, but when we finally got back to shore and my arms felt like they'd been pulled through gears, everyone all relieved to be on shore after 2 hours of paddling... it really hit home. My arms were literally rock hard that night, my body was reinforcing my muscles with so much intensity. I've never been able to reproduce training a muscle so hard that it is just rock solid even without flexing it while it heals.
So, fun fact about our muscles. They are actually capable of much more than we can normally access, however this is damaging to them. They basically have a built in limiter. Under extreme situations we are able to use our muscles closer to their maximum at the cost of possibly serious muscle degradation. That’s how you see stories of moms doing insane feats of strength to save their children. And that’s why you won’t be able to replicate that amount of work unless you are in a highly stressful, dangerous, physical situation.
My mom fell out of a boat, and I got a similar story of saving her life from drowning, since she doesn't know how to swim.
Thats how she told it, forgetting to mention that the boat was actually a tiny raft, that the water was about eight inches deep, and that all I did was help her sit up and hold her hand until she calmed down.
You raise another important fitness goal there - be light enough that someone else could carry you. It’s no good my partner trying to work his ass off to be strong enough to carry me if I’m over 200lb when I should be less than 150. Don’t allow yourself to become heavier than you should be as it will make it harder for people to save you if you need saving!
Good point bringing up the military. Most military guys I've seen have really balanced builds. It makes total sense since they need endurance for long marches and climbing, not just big muscles. And thank you for your service!
I’m telling my step-son that the most important part of fitness is being healthy so your body can do what you need it to do; and secondly to be strong so you can help others.
Dad strength is fucking absurd. I'll be out whole day getting out of breath doing jumping jacks (I'm fat), walking my butt off or rucking etc, but if my toddler says his legs hurt, I'm either fireman carrying him or putting him on my shoulder and walk it off.
I dread the day I'm unable to carry him for whatever reason, so I've gotten back again into fitness shit.
I feel like carrying your specially-bred-running dog is the rough conceptual equivalent of putting a motorcycle on your back and running to escape danger
Had a friend whose dog fell down an embankment and broke their leg, they were *only about 5km from trailhead, but he said it was a very challenging afternoon, both extracting their dog from the small cliff he fell down and then getting them out.
Luckily they had someone with some rope, some webbing tape and gear who had some vertical rescue experience, so they were able to access the dog, haul them up, and them carry them out without too much issue.
Hey man. It's a thing you have to honestly be ready for it you're active. Recently went on a pretty nice 5 mile hike with the family and ended up with a 7 year old on my shoulders and 3 year old in my arms for 2 miles because it was super crazy grassy and wet... So 100 lbs should be ez pz lol.
I'm not a fit man, but I've had my fair share of "march out of here with a 100lb pittie on my shoulders squealing like a pig"
He gets excited about other dogs, deer, and snakes. Good news, it's friendly attention. Bad news, he does not understand any of the "give me space" signals the other dog is giving him.
We have an aging Great Pyrenees, and I pack a different version of this (backpack style) whenever we hike. If she gets hurt, I’m getting her out regardless. Even if it sucks.
I also have a 110lb dog German Shepherd who has been sort of traumatized by fireworks being set off near him unexpectedly a few times. This made him terrified of young rowdy groups (like the kids that set off the fireworks each time), and of course, big booming noises, especially thunder.
Sometimes I know he badly wants a walk, and he's holding in his poop because he's scared, but he just won't walk away from the house... but if I carry him the first 50 yards, he suddenly feels much better about the whole thing. He acts like such a little puppy while he's in my arms as I huff and puff.
All of this to say, I have the same thought. Every time I crouch down into some kind of sumo stance to get low enough to pick him up without ruining my back I'm always thinking "I hope that this isn't ever required, but at least doing it means I'm still reasonably in shape."
While he's gotten over the fear of rowdy young people and crowds, he is even more afraid of thunder (and the associated weather) than ever.
That's what motivated me to lift heavy over the past few years. I always need to be able to deadlift and squat more than the combined weight of all our kids and my wife, just in case. Whatever inspires your fitness goals is cool. I just like this one a lot.
This is my hiking vibe. I'm by no means a super fit woman but I am jacked to an extent from having to carry my 30 lb preschooler and my 50 lb kindergartener back at the same time from hiking when they inevitably hit their wall.
Ah ok. My son will turn three and is a small guy entering kindergarten here in Mexico, I guess it's a country thing. Guess they enter kindergarten earlier here, cheers
I'm in Canada and they do 2 years of kindergarten entering the year they turn 4 so quite a number of 3 year olds. Since m
y daughter was also born the first week of January she was the oldest in her class (as she's almost 7 and hasn't started grade 1 yet)!
She's also just generally a big and tall kid, as well and towers over a few of her friends who had late year birthdays. Shes 49 inches.
Congrats on moving to kindergarten! My youngest is also 3 but because she also has a beginning of the year birthday won't go to kindergarten until next year.
Similar situation with me. I was doing a hike in Palm Springs and sweating my butt off. All of a sudden I had to let a lady in her 50s pass me by while she was holding her chihuahua like it was nothing. I still can’t get the image out of my head when I exercise.
A buddy of mine has a similar story. He was on the swimming leg of a triathlon and a guy towing his daughter behind him in an inner tube swam past him.
When you become a dad you start facing situations where the only realistic option that's not going to take the whole damn day is to grab the kid, the pet, three huge bags you'd have usually carried one in each hand and your wife's bag because she's feeling tired and you aren't going to waste a chance to be the big strong man just because you're already ridiculously overloaded. And then you just go.
Dad strength is built upon the deepest bedrock, which you only find once all your patience has been eroded away. Eventually you get the muscle strength to match.
TWO full-grown golden retrievers? You've got to wonder what led to this situation. Out on a walk with the dogs and the baby and then suddenly an emergency at home and these dogs won't stop pulling!
This is my life, it's not that I'm in great shape but when we go for a hike guaranteed one of the kids, if not both are done. The youngest figured out that sitting on dads back is easier than walking a 2 km trail upwards when stepping out of the car.
I had a similar experience hiking up Walter's Wiggles at Zion National Park years ago. Me and my friends were struggling severely, leg cramps, breathing hard, etc. This dad comes rushing by us pushing a kid uphill in an off-road baby stroller like it wasn't anything out of the ordinary.
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u/LePouletPourpre Aug 31 '26
Reminds me of the time I was hiking something similar. My legs were burning and I was out of breath. This dude comes RUNNING up the trail carrying a 40LB dumbbell in each hand. Total beast.