During lunch all these Mongolians had came down with their horses in the back of their little trucks, it was time for the Nadaam! A nadaam is a horserace; this race was going to be held over 8km, which is one of the regular distances!

All the kids, the jockey’s, were looking after their noble steeds and warming them up. The majority of the kids were boys, ranged from the age of 5 till 14 but there was also a female jock, a 9 year old girl dressed in her yellow silks. Some of them rode in jockey like saddles, others in traditional saddles and some bareback, some kids even rode without shoes! Unfortunately none of the kids were wearing any helmets or vests; however these are getting more popular throughout the nadaam scene. When they were all ready, they chanted a song for good luck and to stay safe, then it was time for them to go to the start line.... 8km’s away. It was time for everyone else to go to the finish line. It took a little while but we could finally see a dust storm coming down over the hazy horizon. Two jocks had cleared themself from the main group, it was going to be a close finish! The last 300 meter, the kids were trying as hard as they could to beat the one and another, everyone was cheering them on, the boy in the orange top won! The first 2 were in and within 400meters the next riders were coming down, the girl in her yellow silks rode her horse to the 3rd placing. The rest of the riders came in a few hundred meters in behind them, they all tried hard but unfortunately not good enough for today. All horses and the jocks were taken back to camp at a cooling down walk while the rest drove back in the vans or motorbikes. Back in camp, it was time for the presentation. Another song was sang as a thanking the horse and to have arrived safely, the first one over the finish line received a ‘gold’ medal, 2nd got a ‘silver’ one and the 3rd got a ‘bronze’ medal, they received a certificate and the winner got 60.000Ŧ (AU$45,-).  The winner was clearly a good horse, he had several medals on his medal browband, the horse could barely see where he was going! After the presentation all the kids were lined up and got a bag of goodies, sweets, a drink and some other things.