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Nagqu Horse Racing Festival is a grand traditional festival in northern Tibet. Held on August 1 every year, this festival will last from 5 to 15 days. Horse racing is an important traditional activity that will be used to spread and share the legend of the prairie with more and more people. So, this ancient Nagqu Horse Racing Festival that enjoys great popularity is an irreplaceable draw to tourism in north Tibet. If you choose to travel to Tibet in the summer, you don’t want to miss this awesome festival that will allow you to have a look at the beautiful scenery in Nagqu and also the unique Tibetan festival atmosphere.
Nagqu Horse Racing Festival
In ancient times, leaders are selected by horse racing and martial arts competition. And the tough environment of the plateau forced people to live with the horses. So, Tibetan people love horses and horses are their necessities. The horse racing festival is considered as the festival for horses. Tibetan people know that fine horses need to be honored and rewarded in this way. Thus, every year during the Nagqu Horse Racing Festival, local people from all places will come to the site, wearing those colorful national costumes and jewelry. They will pitch hundreds of tents around the site of the horse racing venue. People will sing and dance together, exchange goods, and participate in many sports activities. All they show is how enthusiastic, heroic, strong, and true to their lives.
Before the official competition, those racers will circle the huge incense burner to show their respect. And there are lamas chanting scriptures to bless them. Then they will be ready to start the competition. People along the race track will shout to cheer them, a way to express their strong feelings for this festival. The race track varies in length, mostly about ten kilometers. The activities include archery, target shooting, short track sprint, pick Hada on the horses, present barley wine and etc.
There are no strict rules for all those competitions because they are just ways of performance for Tibetan people and the horses. But the champion horse will be quickly known on the grassland. And stories and legends will be composed with the name of the horse to be eulogized everywhere.