AUBURN – Hundreds of spectators lined the Lost Valley parking lot as motorcycles revved engines, spun tires and kicked up a whole lot of dust Sunday afternoon.

“I would describe us as controlled insanity,” said Craig Turcotte.

The 29-year-old Lewiston man is a founding member Vertical Outlaws, a professional street bike freestyle team that took to the pavement during the ski area’s annual Fall Festival and Season Pass Madness event. What started as a group of friends getting together for weekend rides on their motorcycles more than 7 years ago has grown into a 7-man team that performs dangerous and death-defying stunts.

From popping wheelies to spinning cookies, the team of motorcycle daredevils perform and compete throughout the Northeast. But members agree that it’s always nice to perform for the hometown crowd.

“They like us and we like it out here,” said member Chris Gousse explaining why the group wanted to perform at Lost Valley. “It’s nice to promote inside the community.”

And one little kid likes the Vertical Outlaws so much that he took to practicing stunts in the kitchen of his family’s Sabattus home last winter. On Sunday, he took his place among the big boys on a street bike made for a 5-year-old.

“I go sideways on my bike,” said a proud Cameron Chisholm, demonstrating his trick by sitting with both legs on one side of the bike. “See, I go sideways on the one peg and I hold onto the handlebars and give it gas.”

In addition to Vertical Outlaws, Sunday’s event featured activities aimed at bringing together families and connecting high school students from Lewiston with youngsters from throughout the community. Members of the school’s swim team were on hand to man everything from face-painting to games in the festival’s children activities area.

“I think it’s great because we get to do all the different games and all the kids love it and you get them happy and everything,” said Ryan Dubois, 15, of Lewiston.

Fall festival organizers also aimed to get folks thinking early about the winter fun to come with chairlift rides to the top of the mountain and hayrides over to the Apple Ridge area.