Reaching down from the back of his horse, Zanen Pitts grabs the goat carcass, a total of 80 pounds of dead weight, as dust strikes him in the face. The adrenaline rush is never-ending, and the physical demands on his body are unreal. 

He brings the goat up and locks it under his leg. Then his objective is to carry it across the field and drop it in the other team's goal to score a point. 

On offense, he describes it as pushing yourself to your limits to protect the goat. On defense, he says it is “running for your life,” without ever taking a break. 

This was Pitts' equestrian adventure, competing in a sport called Kok-boru for Team USA at the Nomad World Games in Kyrgyzstan early last month. 

Pitts is a Mission Valley local who grew up more invested in basketball than anything else. But he eventually got into roping, qualifying for the Indian finals twice and competing at a collegiate level at the University of Montana Western and at the University of Montana.  

He roped competitively for a handful of years. After getting injured, he started coaching Arlee basketball. Now, he and his wife run a bison ranch operation, and he still keeps up his horsemanship by riding often. 

Describing his adventure in Kyrgyzstan, Pitts said he’s had a lot of really special experiences throughout his life, and “this one ... climaxed them all.” 

Kok-boru is a traditional Central Asian horseback sport, where a total of eight players, four from each team, take a goat carcass, carry it while riding and throw it into the opposing team's goal. While the offensive team tries to reach the goal, the defense tries to block opponents and wrestle for possession while staying on their horse. 

The sport is part of Kyrgyzstan’s cultural heritage, and its teams often take home world titles. Pitts added that it’s sort of a rule in their country that you learn to ride before you can walk. Their team doesn’t ride horses worth less than $100,000, and the team is packed with massive men, with hands bigger “than their horses' feet,” he said. 

Pitts has known the Kok-boru Team USA captain for 20-plus years, and the captain reached out and said, "Dude, you gotta come for a lot of reasons: one, so you can play and two, so you can see what kind of guys we need to recruit."  

Pitts said the captain finally convinced him, and it was the most epic time ever to participate because the event's opening ceremony was Kyrgyzstan’s Independence Day celebration. Tons of money went into the event, and world leaders joined the festivities, including Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

“It was the perfect storm of epicness,” Pitts said. 

When recruiting, he said they started with a 20-person dream team, then narrowed it down to those with a passport and no conflicts. They have tried to recruit some “top Indian cowboys,” but Pitts said the event is during the worst time of year to recruit, often when final runs are occurring.

He explained that recruiting can also be challenging because Indian Relay riders may have the riding skills needed for the sport but lack the required strength, and steer wrestlers may have the strength but lack riding experience. 

Ultimately, they ended up with a team of eight from across the United States, while other teams had 12 or 15 guys. 

It took 60 hours of flying to get there, and then Pitts spent six days learning the sport from the professional Kyrgyz team. They were also provided with a string of horses from the team. 

When it came to game time, Pitts explained that the sport takes a great amount of strength and horsemanship, requiring him to use every muscle. The game operated under a pool play system, meaning they had to win multiple rounds to move forward

However, they matched with the Kyrgyzstan team, which was the “greatest assembled team of all time,” he said. Pitts added that several teams didn’t attend the Nomad World Games because they knew they wouldn’t beat Kyrgyzstan. 

Pitts believes if they hadn’t matched with Kyrgyzstan, they probably would have won that round because all his teammates were well-muscled. He was the smallest member of the team, he said. 

Next, they matched with Russia and played each 45-minute game with every competitor “firing on all cylinders.” Pitts said their match against Russia was barely a loss, but with only eight players, they had fewer rotations, meaning their team was more tired than others. Ultimately, they went 0-3 in pool play. 

Regardless of the loss, Pitts said multiple people stopped them and said, “You Americans are getting good; this is exciting.” 

Although it is a vastly different country from the United States, Pitts said he felt right at home with a huge lake and mountains all around him.

The games rotate every two years, and Russia is set to host next. Pitts said he’s competitive and hates to lose. So, since this was “super fun,” he plans to compete again and prove that he “can do better.”