brings in tens of thousands of people<\/a> for what\u2019s considered one of the largest three-day motorcycle rallies in the Southeast.<\/p>\nWhat You Need To Know<\/p>\n
The 29th Leesburg Bikefest kicked off with thousands of visitors Friday
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It is expected to draw over 100,000 people from all over Central Florida and out-of-state
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This event is free to all and will continue into Sunday
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City officials anticipate that the motorcycle rally and entertainment event will generate over $40 million for Lake County<\/p>\n
Hearing the sound of motorcycles is a noise that\u2019s pretty much unavoidable if you\u2019re anywhere near downtown Leesburg this weekend, as people fill their streets with music, one-of-a-kind bikes and even some special characters.<\/p>\n
Tabares Peake came as a green Power Ranger.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe went down to the end of the street, and a bunch of kids came up running saying I see you on TV, \u2018I watch you every day,\u2019\u201d said Peake.<\/p>\n
Peake and the rest of his fellow rangers said this is their second Bikefest, and they love seeing all the bikes and different people from all over.<\/p>\n
City officials say they plan this event months in advance.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is essentially our Super Bowl. If not the biggest, it\u2019s one of the biggest events in Lake County, so the county as a whole really benefits from it, not just Leesburg,\u201d said Leesburg special events manager Maggie Lyden.<\/p>\n
Lyden says they expect more than 100,000 people from all over to visit their city throughout the weekend, which is one of the reasons \u201cUncle Vic\u201d from Ontario has chosen to attend on three separate occasions.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the people you meet. Everybody\u2019s from different places, you know,\u201d shared Vittorio \u201cUncle Vic\u201d Calcagno.<\/p>\n
Some visitors say they are seeing less out-of-state visitors this year, possibly due to rising costs like gas prices, but if you ask Calcagno, it could always be worse.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think that gas prices are doing anything. I mean, we ride, and it doesn\u2019t matter what the price is, we\u2019re going to ride,\u201d Calcagno explained. \u201cAnd compared to Canada, it may be $5 a gallon here, but it\u2019s about $8 a gallon at home.\u201d<\/p>\n
While organizers considered the impact of prices, they felt that with this year\u2019s them to celebrate America\u2019s 250th birthday, paired with their events and music lineup, is enough to keep the crowds coming.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s been a lot of excitement about this year, and a lot of positive feedback about what we incorporated this year,\u201d Lyden said. \u201cOur headliners got us to sell out our Saturday night for VIP and Friday night is almost there.\u201d<\/p>\n
This event is free to all and will continue into Sunday, so you have plenty of time to check out what Leesburg\u2019s Bikefest has to offer.<\/p>\n
According to the Lake County Office of Tourism, this year\u2019s Bikefest is expected to generate more than $40 million dollars across Lake County, as hotels throughout the area are almost at capacity and businesses are looking to make record high sales.<\/p>\n
You can view the full statement from Lake County Office of Tourism Director Ryan Ritche below:<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year\u2019s Leesburg Bikefest is expected to draw more than 100,000 attendees during the three-day weekend, with visitors coming from across Florida and around the country. This year alone, Leesburg Bikefest is expected to generate more than $40 million in economic impact across Lake County. Hotels are at near capacity during the weekend. Restaurants and the downtown area will be busy throughout the weekend with increased spending at local retail shops, gas stations and attractions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is more than just a festival, it\u2019s one of the most impactful tourism drivers we have, bringing in tens of thousands of visitors and tens of millions of dollars into our local economy in just one weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis event is a true community effort! Everyone comes together to make sure visitors have a safe and memorable experience.\u00a0 We want to thank our partners the City of Leesburg, local law enforcement, and public safety for their focus on providing a safe, well-managed and welcoming environment.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LESSBURG, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Bikers from all over have already started revving their engines through the streets of Leesburg for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":247036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4092,14105,28,30,29,2174,115,139,106,835],"class_list":["post-247035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-app-things-to-do","tag-brandon-spencer","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-lake-county","tag-news","tag-orlando","tag-things-to-do","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/247036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}