WEYBURN – Organizers for the Weyburn Fair days are “happy” with the attendance numbers and turnout for the various events, held from Thursday evening through to Sunday evening at the Weyburn exhibition grounds, with total attendance just under 6,000 people.
“It’s down from last year, but it’s on par with what we had before COVID. Last year was the best attendance ever, but I don’t know if we’ll ever see those numbers again,” said Jeff Clay of the Weyburn Ag Society. “That was an exceptional year.”
He noted a year ago, they weren’t even going to have a fair, but then COVID restrictions were lifted and in about two weeks or so, the Ag Society quickly put together a Fair and people came out to enjoy themselves after dealing with the restrictions for the previous year and a half.
Friday night was the busiest day for the Fair overall, especially in the evening for the Souris River Rodeo.
“That’s probably the best crowd we’ve had for the rodeo for a long time,” said Clay.
The grandstands were fairly full on Sunday afternoon for the Rumble in the Ring demolition derby at the Weyburn Fair, which also featured lawn mower races and a burnout competition.
There was a smaller field of competitors for the demo derby, but a much larger group came out for the lawn mower races, plus the Soo Line Cruisers held a burnout competition.
The overall winners from the feature final were Colton Dodd in first place, Jared Bourassa in second, and Dustin Kennedy in third.
In the first heat, Dustin Kennedy and Josh Krause were the winners who moved on to the feature event. From the second heat, the winners were Sheldon St. Denis and Jared Bourassa.
In the mini-van mash-up, Jeff Clay won first and TJ Metheral placed second.
The hardest hit award went to Jeff Clay, and the Mad Dog award went to Colton Dodd.
The best-dressed award went to Mac Metheral, and the “Dog Gone It” award went to Logan Waddell. The mechanics award went to Sheldon St. Denis.
In the burnout competition, put on by the Soo Line Cruisers, Nathan Hallberg won first place in the Magnum, and Dennis Cherpin was second, driving a Firebird.
The other competitors were Jesse Douglas in the Sion and Rex Whitrow, driving a Ford F150 pickup.
For the lawn mower races, which were held between heats of the demo derby, TJ Metheral won first place overall with second going to Freddie deWinter. In the drag race, Karson Thue won first, and Curtis Robertson placed second.
The Ag Society also had the assistance of about 100 volunteers, over and above the members of the Ag Society itself who did a lot of behind-the-scene things making sure everything ran well, said Clay.
“We found other groups to help us, like businesses and other organizations. That’s all volunteer work, none of them were paid,” said Clay, commenting this was the only way an event like the Fair could go forward, with people helping out with various things like running the gate or the knocker balls game.
