Buffalo racers in Bali are battling to keep tradition alive

5 Sept 2016 10:18 AM IST

Wearing crowns and colourful horn coverings, the buffaloes haul wooden carts at high speed.

The buffalo racing, known as \"Makepung\", pits two farming communities against each other in western Jembrana district (Photo: AFP)
The typical prize money for each session of the Makepung race is 25 million rupiah ($1,900) but that is split among the whole winning team, often made up of 1-200 people (Photo: AFP)
\"Many of the older racers would like to retire, some are already over 60, but they simply don't have much choice. Somebody needs to preserve the tradition.\" (Photo: AFP)
But regular competitors are now elderly and few of the younger villagers are keen to take up the sport (Photo: AFP)
The season runs from July to November, with races roughly every fortnight, and this year involved about 300 water buffaloes (Photo: AFP)
Hundreds of spectators cheer from the sidelines, hoping their team will come out on top in the annual festival on the Indonesian island (Photo: AFP)
The Makepung tradition started in the 1960s when two communities on either side of the Ijo Gading river took a competitive approach to working their fields (Photo: AFP)

The buffalo racing, known as \"Makepung\", pits two farming communities against each other in western Jembrana district (Photo: AFP)

Wearing crowns and colourful horn coverings, the buffaloes haul wooden carts at high speed.