Flawless. That's how organizers of the first Rally on the River described the event.

"It was absolutely awesome," said Rick Jansen, co-founder of the Friends of Ironton, organizers of the rally. "We couldn't have dreamed it could be any better."

The three-day event, held Friday, Saturday and Sunday included several motorcycle events, a car show and live music downtown.

"It's hard for me to put it in words," Jansen said. "It was almost an enlightening experience."

Jansen estimated that approximately 2,500 participants were in attendance by noon on Saturday. That estimate swelled to approximately 4,000 by the time the nightly entertainment began, he said.

"I didn't envision it to be any better," Jansen said. "It was perfect. The size of the crowd was perfect. Everybody behaved."

In fact, the only issue, Jansen said, was some traffic congestion - something of a rarity in downtown Ironton.

"I was overwhelmingly surprised at the number of people that were in town," said Ironton Mayor John Elam. "But more than that, I was also surprised at how clean the town stayed, on how there were no problems which is a huge credit to our out-of-town guests and also through the combined efforts of our law enforcement agents."

Elam said the Rally on the River could be the start of something new in Ironton.

He related the change to something that occurred during his children's youth sports games.

"When the coaches were really wanting things to start happening, " Elam said. "They would always express 'OK it's time to start rallying.' The rally phrase was made to inspire and lead those children forward in a winning direction.

"The Friends of Ironton has led the same cry: Ironton is now going to rally," he said.

"My hats off to the Friends of Ironton, local law enforcement agencies, the mayors and their administrative staffs of surrounding cities, all of the people that made contributions and the citizens of Ironton for their volunteerism and support," Elam said.

Both Elam and Jansen said the event could not have been a success without the help of the volunteers involved and the city employees who worked to help make sure the event was a success and trouble-free.

Jansen said the Rally was a success, financially, too. The Friends should know later this week exactly how much money was made for the city.

"We had lots of cash donations during the event," Jansen said. "And all that profit will go back to the city."

Although nothing official has been decided and no date has been set, Jansen said he's looking forward to this being the first of many events.

"I think we're definitely going to do this again," he said.