Around 250 riders participated in the 21st annual Charity Motorcycle Ride for Lansdowne Kids on Saturday, June 28, 2025.
Bob Caissie, a long-time volunteer for Lansdowne Children’s Centre, first started the event over 20 years ago to help raise funds for the organization’s greatest needs, and since then it’s continued to support the local organization year after year.
Although the ride has traditionally been coordinated by the Lansdowne Children’s Centre Foundation in the past, it was announced in March that Ensuring Brant, a not-for-profit community association of volunteers, would be taking over the event.
Brian Kinrade, President of Ensuring Brant and a long-standing participant, said that he and his group were inspired to step in because of their own ties to the organization.
“Lansdowne helped my two sons with their speech therapy and so I wanted to be able to give back,” he said. “It’s just such a great organization and I think there are a lot of people who have, at some point, been touched by Lansdowne and want to help out, so everyone that’s here today has donated in some way, be it with their time or with money, and all of that goes back to the kids.”
Rose Press, Supervisor of Development and Community Engagement with the Lansdowne Foundation, said the funds will ultimately help support a variety of the centre’s programs and services.
“Everything that is raised today will go towards unfunded programs, so those are things like recreation, therapy, camp, and to help the families who have exhausted all other avenues of specialized funding,” she said. “We have the skilled, trained, and educated staff to provide these programs but there just isn’t the funding to operate them and so this event is so important not only from a fundraising perspective, but from an awareness and a community engagement perspective as well so every little bit helps.”
Press added that despite the Foundation pulling back from the event, she was happy to see it continuing on.
“To have Brian step up and say, ‘hey, I’ve ridden in this event, I’ve benefited from Lansdowne and I want to continue to give back,’ it’s really just amazing,” she said. “This event is a beast to organize and Brian has done a great job for his first year.”
The police escorted 90-minute scenic tour kicked off from Brimich Logistics, with riders passing by the centre and travelling through Brant, Haldimand and Norfolk counties before returning back to the starting line for the remainder of the festivities.
This year’s event included a continental breakfast, a hot lunch from Strodes BBQ and Deli, a 50/50 draw, raffle prizes and live entertainment from BarCode, as well as several local and regional vendors to shop from.
Two of the ride’s participants, Donna Johnston and Sharon Dawson, both said they were happy to come back and support the cause.
“I’ve been doing this ride for four years now and it’s just such a beautiful drive, and it really is so cool to see all the bikes out there together,” said Dawson. “It’s really great to be able to give back to the organization and I think one of my favourite parts of the day is when we drive past Lansdowne and get to see all the kids out there waiting.”
“It gives me the shivers every time,” added Johnston.
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
