From Grit to Glory, Belt Sanders Bring MDI Together

Carrie Jones and Shaun Farrar

Oct 14, 2025

The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by The 1932 Criterion Theatre.

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BAR HARBOR—This is a place where fathers strap their babies onto carriers on their backs, nestle a hat on their babies’ little heads, and coo at those adorable faces before cheering on decked-out belt sanders going down a little wooden track.

This is also a place where people open their arms when they see friends who they haven’t been with for maybe a day, maybe a week, maybe a whole summer season, and those friends bound into them for a giant hug.

This is also very much a place where people loft beers and participate in a call and response where they yell, “Sparkle . . .”

And respond “Farts . . .”

So, basically, this is Bar Harbor, Maine.

More specifically, this place is Town Hill, and it’s the site of the belt sander races, which happens once a year, on an October Sunday afternoon at Atlantic Brewing and Mainely Meat BBQ on the Knox Road.

Emcee Bryce Lambert leads call and responses, banter, and moans and cheers during the event which traditionally raises money for the Beth Wright Cancer Center and also raises a whole lot of goofy cheer for racers and participants.

This year?

No different.

The racers cluster around a long wooden track. Onlookers who are of age loft beers and cell phones as heat after heat of belt sanders—those mechanical tools used for sanding rough surfaces, trimming to scribed lines, and leveling surfaces—race against each other.

Weird?

Yes.

Actually, most definitely weird.

But it’s weird only in a good way. And it’s become a Town Hill tradition that many associate with the almost-end-of-the-tourism season on Mount Desert Island and Acadia National Park, a park that has been hosting approximately 4 million visits annually on an island that is the year-round home to approximately 10,500 residents.

During the races, two belt sanders are lifted and carried to the track, plugged in to long orange extension cords and wait for the switch that will turn them both on at once. It’s basically drag racing with power tools.

Bryce Cough, who years ago built the track the sanders rumble down, lets the racers go at the start of the race. The machines grind toward their wins or losses as a crowd of spectators cheer them on.

At the end of the wooden tracks, the racers smack into grain bags and are unplugged. That is unless they stop halfway down instead. Or never start at all.

“The Belt Sander Races are friendly but fierce competition in which decorated belt sanders are raced down two tracks in a double elimination bracket….The winners receive prizes, glory, and eternal bragging rights,” said Allie Sasner last year. She is Atlantic Brewing Company’s marketing and administration manager.

There were winners this year. Those were:

• People’s choice: Kathy’s “Pearly.”
• First Place in 3-inch belt division: Ropp’s “Moonshadow.”
• First Place in 4-inch division: Mark’s “Buckaroo.”

Some contestants dressed up like extras from Yellowstone or a “Pink Pony Club” video. Some wore Carhartts.

Lambert led the crowd in chants of Sparkle Farts, a past year’s favorite named contestant, even though the sander wasn’t there this year.

“Sparkle!” Lambert yelled into his microphone again this year.

“Farts!” the viewers shouted.

“Sparkle!”

“Farts!”

And that is one of the beautiful things that makes Bar Harbor weird, but more than that. It’s one of the beautiful things that makes the entire island a community.

All photos and videos: Shaun Farrar. Gallery photos are sometimes automatically cropped, so to see the full version, head over to our Facebook, which is linked below.

CORRECTION: Autocorrect was our nemesis here and Rob’s Moonshadow should have been Ropp’s Moonshadow. We fixed that at 8:30 a.m. and apologize for the error!

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LINKS TO LEARN MORE

Atlantic Brewing Company’s website.

How to build a belt sander racer. Modifications are NOT allowed at the Bar Harbor race.

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Carrie Jones and Shaun Farrar

Sep 28

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