Far From the Finish Line: Indian Relay Horse Racing Perseveres Through Generations, Despite Its Risks

Relay racing is hard work, requiring dedication and commitment for a race that lasts only minutes and requires one rider, bareback horses and whirlwind laps around a dirt track. Those who compete say it is worth it because of the challenge and that it is a family tradition. For the Carlsons, who are of the Blackfeet Tribe in Montana, and the Tetons, who are of the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes from their Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho, this tradition has been handed down over five generations. 

Miaus Teton said he grew up around racing but realizes he can’t ever step into his grandfather Leo’s shoes as a rider. “I’m just trying to do my part and carry it on—the tradition,” Teton said.

A Fast Start

The Fort Hall Indian Reservation of the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes in southeastern Idaho is known as the birthplace of the Indian relay race. The Shoshone people obtained the horse from the Comanche people, who once were part of the Shoshone Tribe before migrating eventually to Oklahoma during the late 1600s and early 1700s. Lewis and Clark documented the Shoshone people owning horses in their journals in 1806. The Shoshone and Bannock peoples would patrol their tribes’ homelands on horseback to protect themselves from encroachment of white colonialists, and the animals were key to many battles.

According to Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) records, horse racing may have begun in this area as early as 1860, when a Bannock man known as Ocean served as a Pony Express rider between Fort Hall and Fort Boise in Idaho. Pony Express riders would ride over long distances carrying mail from one post to the next, and they would need to change horses quickly and often to finish their routes. Although Ocean only spent a year with the mail route company, the experience apparently was enough to give the Indian relay races a start, said Sam Hernandez, a retired BIA civil engineer who has studied much of the history of Fort Hall. 

Fort Hall was constructed in 1834 by Nathaniel Wyeth, then sold to the Hudson Bay company, which operated as a trading post. A monument still stands at the site. While Hernandez was still working for the BIA, he was able to arrange for aerial photos of the bottomlands near this monument along the Snake River in the Fort Hall Bottoms. The photos revealed a circular oval similar to a racetrack. Hernandez believes that racetrack was used as tryouts for Pony Express riders, who would practice jumping off and quickly getting back on horses. He said tribal elders told him that the birth of Indian relay races was in this area.

According to Shoshone-Bannock oral history, Indian horse relay racing developed on the tribes’ reservation during the 1920s. Among the famed relay racers is the late Keno Coby Jr., also known as Yambasi, who according to his family members was a top relay rider from 1925 to 1935. He won races at the Eastern Idaho State Fair and War Bonnet Round -Up rodeo in Idaho and the Pendleton Round-Up rodeo in Oregon.

The Thrill of the Race

Several tribes have adopted this style of horse racing, and today tribes across the United States and Canada hold such races throughout the summer and into the fall. The Shoshone-Bannock Indian Festival in Fort Hall in August will feature more than 20 competing relay teams. The World Championship Indian Relay is typically held in the summer at the Sheridan Rodeo in Wyoming. One of the biggest races in the United States is the Muckleshoot Gold Cup held in June at Emerald Downs in Washington state. The Horse Nations Indian Relay, which runs from June to September, culminates with the Championship of Champions in September in Wyoming. During the fall, the Fort Hall Indian Relay Association also hosts the National Indian Relay Championship at the Eastern Idaho State Fair and the Pendleton Round-Up in Oregon still has relay races today. 

While the style and length of races may vary some per location, an Indian relay team includes three horses, one rider, a holder, a “mugger” and a back holder. A race typically begins with the drop of a flag or the sound of a horn, at which point the rider either leaps onto a horse who is being held by a holder or the rider who is already on a horse who then takes a running start. The horse and rider race around the track at full speed until they return to the exchange area, where the rider leaps off and jumps onto the second horse that had been held by a back holder for another loop around the track. The mugger has to catch the rider’s first horse and hands it off to a holder. The rider does the lap again for a third time to finish the race. It can be chaotic during the exchanges, and that is when the excitement happens.

Some associations have a variety of races. The Fort Hall Indian Relay Association, for example, offers races for youth, women and men. For the youth, boys and girls ride their ponies from the end of the racetrack to the finish line, about 350 yards or more. They also offer a youth relay in which children have their own teams but run shorter distances within a rodeo arena. During the “ladies’ race” (also called the “maiden’s race” elsewhere), women ride their horses bareback once around the track, and during ladies’ relay, the teams use two horses instead of three. Other races include the “mile race” in which both men and women can ride and the “chief race,” during which men wear headdresses made out of artificial feathers while racing once around the track. During the “warrior race,” men begin the race by running about 25 yards before jumping on the back of a bareback horse to race around the track.

Preparing for a Tough Track

Before a team steps onto a track, however, a lot of preparation must happen, including picking the right horse and training it and its rider. Ervin Carlson has horse racing on both sides of his Blackfeet family. His dad, Charlie Carlson, relay raced during the 1940s and rode and ran racehorses along with his brothers. Ervin also learned horsemanship from his maternal grandfather, John DeRouche, who raised him.

The family has two teams they have run for the past five years: the Carlson team and his son Tony’s Two Medicine team, for which Cody Carlson rides. “When we end up in a race together, we always root for either team,” said Ervin. “We are one family.”

In picking horses for their teams, Ervin buys them off the racetrack. He first observes them in the paddock. He wants one that can stand still in a relay exchange. He also checks their breeding and looks for horses with speed. “I pride myself in picking horses,” he said. Once chosen, the horses must be cared for constantly to maintain their condition. “They’re one of your family,” Ervin said. “You have to take care of them before you feed yourself.”

Prior to racing, the team prays for their horses and paints them to tell a story. “Each marking has meaning,” said Chazz Racine, the Carlson team’s rider. A shield painted on the horse’s chest, for example, is for protection. Paint on the knees is intended to keep the horse running strong. And an arrow from the neck all the way down his body is intended to help with the horse’s breathing during the race.

Racine has been racing since he was 12 years old and takes his horsemanship seriously. To keep in good shape, he eats healthy foods and gets ready for the season by jogging, stretching and working out at a gym. When relay time is nearing, he starts hitting the training harder to improve his breathing. “I have to stay fit all through the winter,” he said. “You wouldn’t believe how much strength [it takes].”

Racine rode bucking horses in rodeos for a number of years and knows relay racing is risky. Dealing with a thousand-pound animal, he has gotten banged up, kicked and bitten, and he realizes anything can happen. Being a relay rider “will test you,” he said.  “You can’t give up and have to be willing to put hours in and take time to learn.”

Being One with a Horse

Relay racers have to have a strong bond with their horses. The Shoshone-Bannock Teton family team, for example, who lives in Lincoln Creek, Idaho, on the north end of the Fort Hall Indian Reservation, has had a long history of knowing how to interact with them.

Shoshone-Bannock rancher Frank Teton taught his sons, Clarence and Leo, how to handle horses when they were children. Clarence started relay racing in the mid-1980s after Leo, who was then a relay rider himself, convinced him to try the sport. Initially, the team competed with saddle horses, but Clarence said they were getting left behind in the dust, so they invested in thoroughbreds and the team took off from there. During the late 1980s, they ran at the Northwest Montana Fair in Kalispell, Montana, and won the championship three times in a row.

Now retired, Clarence still spends about six hours a day working with horses. He emphasizes knowing your horse and “being one with it.” He said one has to be gentle with the animals and talk to them while caring for them. “If you respect them, they’ll respect you,” he said.

Clarence’s son, Tyce Teton, is a holder for the team and has been involved since the late 1990s. He started out as a mugger, catching the horse during the exchange in a race. He credits Clarence with teaching him how to handle horses, and replaced his dad as a mugger on the track.

His grandson, Miaus Teton, grew up around racing but wasn’t interested until Clarence gave him a horse to exercise. While he was riding it, the horse got away from him. But instead of turning away from racing, he learned from that experience, and nearly a decade later, in 2022, he won the National Indian Relay championship at the Eastern Idaho State Fair. When asked what it feels like when racing, he said prior to the race’s start he might be “freaking out,” but as soon as the flag drops, that feeling goes away. Coming in for exchanges, however, he said, is pretty intense. “You’ve got to anchor him (the horse) down,” he said. “That’s tough in itself.”

Clarence’s other grandson, Azeri Coby, rides for a different team. His beginnings as a rider go back to being at the racetrack when he was a child with Clarence. The horse Azeri was riding started bucking, and it scared him. “I was traumatized,” he said. He stayed off horses until he was a freshman in high school. He asked his grandfather if he could ride his horse named “Gray Dog.” He rode up to the sand hill where they exercise their horses, and the horse got away from him. “I guess that’s how we get broken in around here,” he laughed. After that, he helped his grandfather with the team and got used to handling them. He began winning individual races, including the chief and the mile races, and now he has his own horses.

Clarence’s granddaughter Lexie Teton has been a back holder for the team since 2020. “I make sure the horses know who I am, and I talk to them when I need them,” she said. Few women are on the track during the regular relay, but Lexie said being at the races is fun. “I enjoy being out there with my family, and it’s a blessing to learn and be able to do what I do because not a lot of girls can handle the horses like the way I do,” she said. “It takes a lot of strength.”

At the race track, both the Carlton and Teton teams pray for their horses and the teams. It is a dangerous and grueling sport for both the horses and their handlers. But what began as a practice runs around a single racetrack two centuries ago is now and integral part of many Native familys’ lives and cultures. Mary Teton, a former ladies’ race rider and Clarence’s wife, said, “We will continue to keep racing as long as we stay healthy and our youngsters want to carry on the Teton tradition of relay racing. We are grateful for everyone and everything that was done to help our team succeed.”