Camel racing awaits return to golden era

He's trained fresh, young camel jockeys for years, coaching many of his pupils to victory at Nad Al Sheba's camel race track.

But Mohammad Yaseen, a former champion jockey himself, is stumped with the newest batch of jockeys to arrive at his boss's camel farm: nine tiny robots wearing purple Mickey Mouse shirts and red, stuffed jockey hats.

The robots are spread out on a purple rug inside a majlis where Ahmad Bin Kraz, the owner of this camel farm and the robots, Yaseen and six other local farm owners are trying to tame the wild, remote-controlled jockeys.

"Look how the whip flaps out of control," said Yaseen, pointing to a flailing whip that spun frantically off the side of a robot, while Kraz operated the remote from a nearby sofa.

"A camel will never respond to this like it would to a human jockey."

Kraz paid nearly Dh50,000 for robots, but he said that none of them really work.

"This is a remote control car, not a jockey," Kraz said. "Look."

He grabbed one of the robots off the floor and lifted up a small shirt to reveal a drill, lodged just underneath the stuffed head, with the drill bit connected to the whip on the side.

A remote control airplane sensor was attached to the drill, so that when Kraz pushes his remote control, the drill spins, the whip flaps, and, theoretically, the camel speeds up.

Yaseen and Kraz both laughed at the absurdity of the device, at the thought that this robot jockey could ever perform as well as Yaseen did during his peak as a resilient and victorious eight-year-old.

"But what can we do," Kraz asked with a sigh.

It has been over eight months since the UAE government banned the use of teenage boys as jockeys.

All owners of racing camels were ordered to repatriate any jockey under the age of 16.

The ban was a blow to the men seated in Kraz?s majlis, all of them prominent camel farm owners that have invested large amounts of time, money and effort into the sport over the decades.

At their farms, pride and heritage trump technology, and they view the robots as cheap alternatives.

There have been weekly races at Al Wathba Race Track in Abu Dhabi, with millions of dirhams in prize money.

But Kraz and his friends have not raced their camels with robot jockeys since the ban, even though they are battling the costs of maintaining farms with over 40 camels apiece.

"I'm like an ill man who knows he can't be healed, yet still pays for treatment," said Kraz, referring to the out-of-pocket money he continues to spend to keep his farm running.
 
"But we won't race a camel without a real jockey, even if the sport is in a coma right now."

Gaddal Mohammad Al Niel, editor of the nationwide camel racing magazine Alam Al Asayed, insists that camel racing will once again return to the golden era of decades ago.

"There is less participation at the races now, and the pride of the sport has been damaged," said Al Niel.

"But it's a more humane sport now [after the ban], which will encourage sponsors looking for an ethical means of investment. It's going to be bigger and better than before."

Kraz and his friends are sceptical, yet fiercely patriotic. They will always support the decrees issued by their government.

But they are unsettled by changes in the sport.

They insist that all of their jockeys entered the country willingly and with proper visas, and that, most importantly, their young jockeys were better off here than in their native countries.

Yaseen agrees.

As an eight-year-old, Yaseen, now 28, was one of the top jockeys on Kraz's camel farm.
 
He hit his peak around age 10, racking up a string of victories around the country, and then became a man.

Now, he manages Kraz's farm, and for years, he delivered his racing wisdom to budding young jockeys.

Demand for jockeys that fit the current guidelines ? more than 16 years old and weighing over 45 kg ? has been low.

The farm has a small handful of 17-year-old jockeys, like Mohammad Ayub from Pakistan, but Yaseen and Kraz said that it will take years before the camels will be ready to handle the bigger, heavier jockeys.

"I had a better life here than in Pakistan when I was racing," Yaseen admitted the next day, a breezy November morning, while preparing a dozen camels for a light training session across the street at Nad Al Sheba?s race tracks.

"I came from a poor family. But here, I was making more money than my entire family, more than a general in the Pakistani Army. I sent my money back home, and soon, my family became big traders in our hometown."

Although it is peak racing season right now, there have not been any races at Nad Al Sheba, and Yaseen seems to be struggling with the lull.

Walking through the camel pens, his lethargy is infectious and soon, the camels begin to shuffle in the sand with the same listlessness.

"I got married through camel racing," he said, referring to the woman he met in Dubai and then married shortly after he began managing Kraz's farm.

"I bought a house in Pakistan through camel racing. I hope that more young jockeys will have the same chance someday."