In Fairplay, Colo., Burro Racing Packs 'Em In

First thing you need to know about burro racing — there's no riding. It's you on one end of a rope, hundreds pounds of equine on the other. And the burro, says Brad Wann, is the boss.

"Your burro gets up just like you do every day and he goes, 'I want to run' or 'Nah, I'm not running today.' So you just never know what you're going to get," says Wann, who is with the Western Pack Burro Ass-ociation. And yes, they love their puns.

Pack burro racing is the only sport that can claim to be born in — and still be pretty much confined to — Colorado. It might also be the state's smallest sport. And in Fairplay, Colo., the pack burro racing world champion will receive his crown after a 29-mile course up and down a 13,000-foot mountain pass on Sunday.

Some of the competitors are veterans, but not Chris Westermann, who stumbled upon pre-race chaos recently. He was driving by on his way to an endurance race when he pulled off the highway for a pit stop.

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"Use the restroom, come down the street and we're like, 'Look at all those cool donkeys,' " Westermann says. "We come over like, 'What's going on?' They're like, 'It's a race.' Can we enter? 'Sure, let's find you a donkey.' "

A moment later, Willie, the borrowed donkey, mistook Westermann's finger for a carrot. Despite his bruised digit, he was still pumped for his accidental new sport.

"We're going to try to win this thing. I hope Willie's fast," Westermann says.

A Tall Tale

The 40 or so racers parading to the starting line make this a huge event. And the sport got a big honor from the state Legislature this year.

"This is the first official race of Colorado's official summer heritage sport, the sport of pack burro racing," Ass-ociation President Bill Lee proudly tells the crowd.

And with that, the burros are off.

Legend has it the sport started with two miners racing each other to file a claim. In honor of that story, every donkey here is carrying a pick, shovel and gold pan on its back.

But alas, according to longtime racer Hal Walter, burro racing actually began in the 1940s as the offspring of another Colorado industry: tourism.

"The sport was started as the brainstorm of merchants in Fairplay to get people to town for their local summer festival," Walter says. "There was a $500 prize, and everybody got a case of beer I believe."

New pack burro racers in Idaho Springs, Colo., compete in this shorter course as they try their hand at the sport.

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Megan Verlee for NPR

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Walter likes the connection to Colorado's mining past, apocryphal as it may be, but it's the adventure sport aspect that keeps him hooked.

"You're on rugged terrain, you're at high altitude, you're subject to the elements, and what may look like a joke to some people is really a difficult sport to win," Walter says.

I had to give burro racing a shot. It takes a while to get Laredo, a donkey, running. And then, once he is, all I can do is try to keep up, flying down the trail, dodging roots and rocks. It's definitely an extreme sport even if the view can get a bit monotonous.

Back at the race, the first donkeys are sprinting for the finish line, their humans struggling to keep up. Westermann, the endurance racer with the bitey burro, arrives in fifth place.

"Excellent cross-training. Think running up hills is hard, you ought to try running up hill dragging a donkey behind you," Westermann says.

And so Colorado's smallest sport may have just won another convert.

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