How to Host Dog Olympics

Have Dog Olympics at Home

Learn how to host Dog Olympics and have the perfect event for all of your friends to get excited for the real-World Olympics! This guide will walk you through some of the basics on how to have dog Olympics at home so you can start planning a successful pup event for your family and friends. Dog parties are a great way to work on canine socialization and provide great dog training opportunities. Your event can be as extravagant or as simple as you want it to be. Get ready for some fun ideas and start letting your creative juices flow.

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Planning for a Dog Party

Once you have decided that you want to throw a doggy Olympics, you will want some tips on how to plan a successful dog party. You will need to pick a location, create a guest list (dog and human), choose your Olympic challenges, set the ground rules for your 4 and 2-legged guests, decorate, and set up for the actual event.

Make sure your location is puppy safe and that it has enough room to use whatever equipment you will need to set up for your events. Remember to have several water stations available for the dogs and some shaded areas so they have the option to get out of the sun if you are hosting it outside.

Remember to have a Dog First Aid Kit available in case one of your guests may need medical assistance.

This is one event where it might be best if all the dogs were kept on a leash unless it’s their turn to compete. This way they won’t interfere with each other during the games. Let the owners know when their dog needs to be leashed so there is no confusion for the owners or the dogs.

Remind the dog owners that good sportsmanship is required, and the safety of the dogs comes first. One time at an event, a woman shoved my dog off a chair so her dog could win. Luckily my dog wasn’t injured and wasn’t the type to defend himself. The woman’s action easily could have resulted in her or my dog being injured. Politely remind all humans that these are just games and keep an eye out for unsafe competitiveness.

Decorations

If you are hosting a Dog Olympics in the same year as the actual Olympics, you can choose to decorate in the theme of the host country. You can even assign each dog a country to represent. You can select the countries by doing a random drawing or by breed.

For example, If you have a Chow Chow, they can represent China, a Chihuahua can represent Mexico or a Siberian Husky can represent Russia. You can also use the countries represented by your guests when you are decorating. Simple ideas are the flags of each country and the famous Olympic Games symbol or torches.

Snacks

When providing snacks for your guests, you will want to check to see if there are any allergies or sensitivities you need to be aware of. If you would like to provide snacks that also go along with the theme, you can choose foods from the hosting country and the countries represented by your guests. This will be easier with food for the humans, but you can have some fun with the dog snacks too. It could be as easy as putting flags on plain vanilla dog-friendly cupcakes or you can try to find recipes for homemade doggy treats.

Choosing Dog Olympic Events

Now it’s time to choose and set up the events for your Dog Olympic party. Remember that you don’t have to plan a ton of challenges for your event. Just stick to 3-5 different games to start. You can always add more to future gatherings. When picking the Olympic Games for your party, consider the capabilities of the dogs that will be coming. Do they do agility or scent training? Do they like to run or jump? You can make a game out of almost anything. To get you started, here are several ideas from our list of dog party games for your first Dog Olympics.

Race

Have a start and finish line marked out and a timer ready. Have each dog take their turn running the racetrack. Have the owner at the finish line ready to call the dog to them when it’s ‘go time’.  It is best to have each dog run the track individually so they don’t start chasing each other which could lead to mayhem. All other canine guests should remain on a leash. Have someone stand by to time and record each dog’s race time and the fastest dog wins.

Reverse Limbo

Have an adjustable hurdle set up (you can make one yourself or buy one). Set it up on the lowest rung. Have each dog jump over it. If a dog doesn’t make it, they get disqualified. Once all dogs have attempted it, raise the bar and have the dogs that haven’t been disqualified jump the new height. The last dog standing (the one that can clear the highest jump) wins.

Dunking For Balls

There are multiple ways to play this game. You will want to fill a small kiddie pool or a tub with water and put either balls or hotdogs in it. The first way is to set a timer anywhere from 10- 60 seconds for each dog. The dog who gets the most balls or hotdogs out of the water wins. You might have to play with the depth of water for the hotdog dunking to see what the dogs are comfortable with. If this activity is very new to the animals, you might just give the dogs credit for getting even one ball or hotdog and advancing them to a 2nd round.

The other way is to put a mark on one of the balls. If the dog is able to get the ball with that mark on it, they will advance to the next round. You can also time this and the dog who gets the marked ball in the shortest amount of time wins.

Agility

If the dogs that attend do agility training, you can set up an agility course and time them on it. The quickest time to complete the course wins.

Behavior Race

Get a list of 3-5 behaviors that all of your dog guests can do. Time each dog and owner going through the list. The dog that successfully completes all the behaviors first (or the fastest) wins. Dogs can either compete one at a time or all together.

Prizes and Award Ceremony

Every Olympics has a ceremony with medals presented to the winners. You can buy medals, certificates, or trophies to give out to the winners. If you want to save money, you can make medals by using ribbons and different colored washers to represent the famous Gold, Silver, and Bronze.

Your award ceremony can be as intricate and fancy as you’d like it to be. Have a full-on ceremony after all the events are over. You can call each winner up and place their medal around their neck with tons of pomp and circumstance while “We are the Champions” is playing in the background or you can simply hand the medals out immediately after each event. It is up to you!

Happy Dog Olympics!

“Victory is in having done your best. If you’ve done your best, you’ve won”

Bill Bowerman

Now that you have a game plan for your Dog Olympics event, make sure to enjoy yourself! The hard part is planning and setting up the dog parties. Once that part is done, make sure you and your pup have ample opportunity to enjoy yourselves. And do not forget to take pictures of your party so you can all remember what an awesome time everyone had.

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