For these Philippine cowboys, rodeo is tradition and livelihood, not just a Wild West import

MASBATE – The bull bursts out of the gate before the crowd can catch its breath.

For a split second, bull rider Harold Indapan holds steady, his left hand locked around the rope, his right hand raised free. The fringe on his denim jeans sways in rhythm with the bull beneath him.

The bull bucks wildly, trying to unseat him. Dust rises in thick clouds, swallowing Mr Indapan whole. The crowd roars, but he shuts it all out.

“When that gate opens, I tell myself I can’t fall. I must trust that God won’t let me fall off that bull,” Mr Indapan told The Straits Times on April 12, days before entering the arena.  

He needs at least eight seconds to qualify – and to hold on longer still to win – against an animal built to throw him off.

“It’s 50 per cent the rider, 50 per cent the bull,” he said.

On that sweltering April afternoon in Masbate, an island province in central Philippines, it was enough. The 29-year-old – representing the southern Philippine province of Bukidnon – rode it out, emerging as champion again at the Philippine National Rodeo Finals. He also won in 2024, the last time the contest was held.

“You’re a true cowboy if you know the work on the ranch through and through. It’s not just about the looks or the swagger,” he said.

In Masbate, some 549km south-east of Manila, scenes like this unfold for one week each year, when the island transforms into the country’s rodeo capital.

Once part of Spain’s vast colonial network linking Asia and the Americas, the island still carries traces of that past in the way its cowboy culture took root.

Its annual festival, called Rodeo Masbateno, is widely regarded as the only organised rodeo culture of its kind in Asia, drawing hundreds of Filipino cowboys and cowgirls from across the archipelago.

What looks, at first glance, like a spectacle lifted from the Wild, Wild West is, for many here, simply work reframed as sports and absorbed into daily life.

From colony to cattle country

Masbate’s wide, gently rolling grasslands have long made it a natural home for cattle.

Filipino historian Danilo Madrid Gerona, in his book Las Islas De Masbate: A Beacon Of Faith, A Fortress Of Resistance, traces the island’s ranching roots to the 16th century, when Spanish colonisers took cows and horses through the Manila-Acapulco galleon trade linking the Philippines and Mexico.

When the Americans took over at the turn of the 20th century, ranching practices were further popularised, helping lay the groundwork for rodeo as a public spectacle.

By the post-World War II years, ranchers were cross-breeding native stock with foreign breeds, importing genetic material from countries like Australia to improve their herds.

For Mr Manuel Sese, president of Rodeo Masbateno Inc, which organises the annual rodeo festival, this history is lived experience for residents on the island.

“Culture is acquired and developed,” the 76-year-old ranch owner told ST. Many of the island’s ranchers still carry Spanish surnames and “everyone here has a background as a cattle raiser, an animal handler or a farmer”.

Ranching families often send their children away to study, only for them to return and take over the land.

Growing up in Masbate often means growing into the rodeo itself, residents said.

Teams compete across a range of events drawn from everyday ranch work: bull riding, carambola or cattle wrestling, casting down and lassoing.

Winners take home modest cash prizes ranging from 25,000 pesos ($530) for first place to 10,000 pesos for third.

The festival is also drawing attention beyond the Philippines. Among those who watched in 2026 was international rodeo champion and Hollywood stuntman David Alvarado, who travelled to Masbate out of curiosity about its rodeo. The crowd were mostly locals, but there were a handful of foreigners who came to watch.

“Being a cowboy is basically a lifestyle,” the Texan bull rider told ST. “Either you’re a cowboy or you’re not.”

For ranch owner Alfredo Revil, what sets Masbate apart is that the culture is not performative.

In places like Texas, he told ST, cowboy identity often carries a stylised image shaped by popular culture. But in Masbate, said Mr Revil, there is little of that. Cowboys are simply “cowhands”, doing the work as it comes, like tending cattle and moving herds through the ranch.

What unfolds in the arena is not spectacle but an extension of that routine. “It’s livelihood,” Mr Revil said.

On his ranch, cattle must be counted, fed and treated. Horses are tools, not props.

Breaking glass ceilings

Ranching here is also inheritance. Today, Mr Revil’s daughters are running their own ranch adjacent to his, a quiet shift in a field long dominated by men.

That shift is beginning to show in the arena, too.

Among the competitors in 2026 are women pushing into what has traditionally been a male-dominated space.

For Ms Abegail Liwanag, who was part of an all-female team from Central Mindanao University that advanced to the national finals in the casting down event, simply making it to Masbate is significant.

“It’s very rare for us women to engage in these types of games,” said the 22-year-old from Bukindnon. “So just being here is fulfilling.”  

Her teammate, Ms Biverlie Bermudez, 21, grew up around livestock and was drawn early to the work. Handling cattle, she said, requires precision more than brute force.

“What we do in the arena reflects what we do on the ranch,” she said. “When you restrain an animal properly, it makes it easier to treat them.”

A festival borne out of crisis

The Rodeo Masbateno festival was launched in 1993 to halt a steep decline in the province’s cattle industry.

In the early 1990s, Masbate’s cattle population fell sharply – from around 96,000 heads to just 34,000, according to Mr Sese.

The festival aimed to draw attention to the crisis and revive interest in cattle raising. Over time, it grew into a national competition, typically divided into professional and student categories, with a tourism push aimed at bringing visitors to a province often left out of mainstream travel routes.

But Mr Sese concedes the gains have been limited. While the festival draws crowds each year, it has yet to generate the kind of sustained tourism needed to support the industry, particularly in Masbate, one of the Philippines’ poorer and more remote provinces.

Government data shows there are currently over 68,000 cattle in Masbate as at January 2026.

Sustaining the festival, however, has never been easy.

In 2026, organisers were forced to scale back as funding from donors fell short, amid broader belt-tightening efforts as oil prices surged following the conflict in the Middle East. Support from city and municipal governments, which typically sponsor teams, also thinned.

The number of events was reduced, including staples such as the Juego de Toro, a chaotic street contest in which cattle are released on cordoned-off roads and then chased by locals, who get to keep the animal they catch. The rodeo competition was initially shortened from the usual six days to just four before it was extended to five. There were even calls to postpone the festival altogether.

It went ahead anyway, helped by a late infusion of support from First Lady Louise Araneta-Marcos and her son, who attended the opening programme on April 13 and pledged five million pesos.

Where tradition meets scrutiny

Animal welfare groups have long criticised rodeo practices globally, arguing they cause unnecessary stress and harm to animals.

During the April 14 cattle drive – which recreates the historic route cattle once took through the city to the port during colonial times – organisers repeatedly warned residents to stay out of the animals’ way.

Still, one animal broke from the herd.

An elderly man, who appeared to think the drive had passed, was stepping into a shop when the animal struck his leg.

Within seconds, cowboys moved in, the rodeo contestants who also act as marshals during such incidents. They used ropes to subdue the animal, forcing it to the ground as they waited for its handlers to retrieve it.

The man was attended to by medics and later taken away in an ambulance. Handlers attended to the animal, spraying antiseptic on its wounds before returning it to its corral.

To animal welfare advocates, such scenes highlight deeper concerns.

“Animals are placed in fear-inducing situations. The animals are terrified. They don’t understand what’s happening,” said lawyer Anna Cabrera, executive director of the Philippine Animal Welfare Society.

She said the practices involved in Rodeo Masbateno – chasing, lassoing, wrestling cattle – cause “unnecessary suffering” for the cattle and should be phased out.

“It’s really a pure barbaric display for the entertainment of those who are still amused by violence,” she told ST.

The organisers and rodeo participants see it differently.

Mr Indapan said large animals cannot be safely handled without restraint.

“At the rodeo, we’re showing people how to handle cattle properly, how to cast them down without causing harm,” he said. “That’s just how ranching life works.”

Organisers added that veterinarians are present throughout the festival to monitor the animals. They ensure that each animal is used only once during the competitions to help minimise stress.

A cowboy’s burden

Back in the arena, the dust settles as the bull beneath Mr Indapan slows, then stills. He slips off, landing on his feet.

Two days later, he would be crowned champion.

But risks never quite leave the ring.

Earlier in the week, another rider was struck by a bull’s horn, leaving a deep gash on his cheek.

For the crowd, the moment passes. Another score, another name.

But for the riders, the stakes remain.

Back home, cowhands like Mr Indapan are paid roughly 25,000 pesos a month, making a rodeo win a rare windfall. He takes on extra work, including shoeing horses, to help feed his family.

Despite the tight margins, he does not see himself ever putting the cowboy hat away.  

“It’s the life I grew up in. It’s how I’m making a living for my family, how I sent myself to school when I was younger,” Mr Indapan said.

“This is where I belong.”