Canada's Largest Ribfest turns 30 at Spencer Smith Park over Labour Day weekend

Canada's Largest Ribfest, which is the event's actual name and not a boast, returns to Spencer Smith Park over the Labour Day long weekend for its 30th year. Sixteen rib teams, 21 live bands and a midway run Friday, September 4 through Monday, September 7.

Hours are 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday through Sunday, then 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on the Monday. ABBA Revisited headlines Sunday night, back by popular demand, with Freedom Train, Stone the Radio, Fiddlestix and James Anthony also on the bill. The big tent returns for a third year, so there is shelter and somewhere to sit down if the weather turns.

The Rotary Burlington Lakeshore fundraiser started in 1996 with a couple of rib teams and beer poured out of horse troughs, after two club members saw a ribfest at a bike race in the United States and thought it could work here. Volunteer co-chair Jay Bridle says it has raised about $6 million for at least 35 local and regional charities since then, sorted into three pillars: health, hunger, and humanity and social services. Joseph Brant Hospital, Carpenter Hospice, Burlington Food Bank, Food for Life, Canadian Legion Branch 60 and Community Living Burlington are among the recipients.

Staying that size took work. Co-chair Brent Paszt says he and Bridle shrank the footprint, cut the second stage and trimmed costs to keep the event viable after the pandemic, and about $1 million has been raised since Ribfest came back in 2021. "As a result, the event is as strong as ever," Paszt said. Roughly 20 vendors are booked this year, and organizers are still looking for volunteers.