ASTANA, Kazakhstan -- Ladd Howell had his head in his hands and appeared inconsolable.
Competing in its fourth World Nomad Games in Astana this week, the U.S. national team he captains had just come agonizingly close to its first win in a sport that foreign media likens to "goat polo."
In the end, the United States lost to Turkey on penalty shootouts after surrendering a 1-0 lead in the opening round of one of the games' two competing "goat-grabbing" competitions.
"I'm not ready for an interview," Howell said, as his steed carried him away from the hippodrome and into the fading light.
In the grand scheme of things, the result was irrelevant.
Thanks in large part to the biannual World Nomad Games, which concluded on September 13, this equestrian sport with centuries-old roots is on the rise, with more nations than ever in the mix.
But in the end, only Kyrgyzstan or Kazakhstan seem to win it.
Kyrgyzstan's Kok-Boru, Kazakhstan's Kokpar
International audiences may be more familiar with Afghanistan's version of goat-grabbing, buzkashi, which was featured in the 1988 Hollywood blockbuster Rambo.
Buzkashi, banned during the first Taliban regime, is considered Afghanistan's national sport and has even survived the hard-line Islamist group's return to power and the restoration of many of its infamously draconian restrictions.
But Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan boast the fiercest rivalry in the sport today, with each laying claim to their own distinct versions of the game -- kok-boru ("gray wolf") in Kyrgyzstan, and kokpar (literally "goat-grabbing") in Kazakhstan.
Both kok-boru and kokpar, which were each part of the World Nomad Games, are takes on a time-honored Eurasian nomadic pastime that sometimes involve hundreds of horsemen but which lack the set boundaries required for a spectator sport.
During the World Nomad Games, the two sports were confined to teams of four equestrians competing on a field of about the length of two football fields, but the objective essentially remained the same as it always has -- getting the goat carcass into the goal.
By tradition, the teams would actually use a specially prepared, partly amputated, and decapitated goat carcass. But at the games, the carcass is swapped out for a dummy weighing about 30 kilograms.
For nearly two decades, kok-boru was accepted as the regional standard.
"Kok-boru dates back to 1996," Samat Dzhumakadyrov, press-secretary of Kyrgyzstan's Kok-Boru federation told RFE/RL on the sidelines of the U.S.-Turkey kok-boru showdown in the six-team tournament.
But one major difference can be seen in the goal, which in kok-boru's case, Dzumakadyrov said, came into being after the legendary Kyrgyz film director Bolot Shamshiev said "he saw the tai-kazan in a dream."
The tai-kazan is a large, elevated scoring bowl that players are tasked with hoisting the goat carcass into.
But the first models of the tai-kazan were made of solid earth and caused no shortage of injuries as riders stormed the goal.
This, and Kyrgyzstan's growing dominance of the sport, offered Kazakhstan a powerful incentive to develop kokpar, using a circle on the ground rather than a tai-kazan. The change has been fortuitous for Kazakhstan, with some theorizing that the Kyrgyz horses are so accustomed to the tai-kazan that they get disoriented when competing in kokpar.
Kazakhstan hosted the first world championships of kokpar in 2017 and duly beat Kyrgyzstan in the final. And that has more or less been the pattern ever since: Kazakhstan wins at kokpar and Kyrgyzstan wins at kok-boru, with their respective opponents annihilated en route to the final.
'Shame, Shame, Shame!'
Kyrgyzstan was looking to break the pattern this time by reserving its best riders for the kokpar tournament, in which nine teams competed, rather than kok-boru.
To begin with everything went to plan, with Kyrgyzstan taking a 3-1 lead over Kazakhstan in the September 12 kokpar final.
But the game turned on an ugly incident in which a Kazakh rider hit his Kyrgyz opponent with a riding crop at least twice.
After that, the teams clashed and there was a long stoppage, while journalists filming the game from close proximity were asked to retreat.
The game ended with Kazakhstan winning 5-4 and the Kyrgyz accusing the Kazakh referees of ignoring multiple infringements. They almost boycotted the medal ceremony.
In an interview with Kyrgyz media, Kyrgyz team manager Erlan Abdykaparov said Kazakh national security officials had requested his team not to "sow discord between the two nations."
Inevitably, tensions in the hippodrome spilled over onto Instagram.
"My brother, you showed your sport in the worst way. If you will play like that, then kokpar will never develop outside of Kazakhstan," ran a typical Kyrgyz comment.
"Shame, shame, shame! Where is your dignity?" read another.
Kyrgyz expecting contrition from the Kazakh side will likely have been disappointed with the response of the Kokpar Federation's honorary president, lawmaker Aidarbek Qojanazarov.
He cited "an unwritten rule of kokpar" that "dust raised on the field should stay on the field."
"There's no denying that the Kyrgyz kokpar team was well-prepared and trained their horses skillfully. But the Kazakh team was clearly superior," he added.
"Friendship between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan is more valuable than any game result. Today Kazakhstan wins, tomorrow Kyrgyzstan will," Qojanazarov said.
The prediction quickly came true. Kyrgyzstan prevailed in its version of goat-catching just a few hours later, thrashing Kazakhstan 10-4 in kok-boru.
The four kok-boru also-rans -- the United States, Turkey, Uzbekistan, and Russia -- will have to wait another day for the chance to be crowned world champions of goat-grabbing.
