Camel Racing

Papa and I decide to drive out to the camel racing track is just outside of Doha. It isn't published when the actual camel races occur so you just go out in the morning and see if you get lucky. If no races are going on, they train the camels everyday, so you can at least see that.

We didn't get to see an actual race, but we saw hundreds of camels both training on the track and walking along the road to/from the track and the stables.

All the riders were super friendly and waved at us as we took their pictures.

Now for a bit of history: up until 8 years ago, the camel jockeys were 3-5 year old boys brought here from poor countries. Can you imagine Avery racing camels?! Well, actually, in Avery's case I can, but typically a 3-5 year old would be crazy young to be riding a camel running at full speed. The theory was that the Qatari camel owners were giving these kids a chance at a good education that they wouldn't have access to in their he countries.

But then, along came a journalist who did a big story on these kids and all the injuries and deaths from falling off the camels. The journalist said that the kids with fractures were the lucky ones because they got a break from the terror of getting back on the camel right away. Soon after, the practice of using kids as jockeys was banned.

They now use robot jockeys that you can see on the back of some of the camels. They then drive around the outside of the track during the race controlling their robot jockeys. I hope we get to see that in action!