Overview The Arizona Balloon Classic is a three-day hot air balloon race and festival at Wild Horse Pass on the Gila River Indian Community in Chandler, Arizona, where competition pilots fly target tasks on Saturday and Sunday mornings and the balloons light up the field as glows every night. It falls on Martin Luther King Jr. weekend in January. Arizona Events Group, a Phoenix event production company, produces it, and it partnered with Rainbow Ryders, a hot air balloon company, for its 2026 return. On site Friday opens at 4 p.m. for the first night glow. Saturday and Sunday the gates open at 7 a.m. and balloons launch between 7:30 and 8:30, with pilots taking off away from the grounds and flying in to drop markers on targets. Tethered rides go up mornings and evenings. Through the day the Street FoodFest runs food vendors, beer tents and live and DJ music, and the evening glows run from 7 to 9. The 2026 program added Native American dancers and a kite festival. Guests can stay from the dawn launch to the last glow, a 14-hour day on the weekend. The festival grounds have paved parking, pets are allowed, and the event runs rain or shine. Track record The festival started in 2011 on Gila River Indian Community land with nothing but glows and ascensions, no stage and no kids' area. It then spent seven years in Goodyear, where the 2025 edition drew more than 18,000 people, and moved back to Wild Horse Pass for 2026 with about 25 pilots and competition flying added. The festival says it has been featured on Good Morning America. Brand presence Sponsors can put a name on the balloons themselves, with a banner on a balloon envelope or a basket banner tied to a single pilot. Larger positions attach to parts of the weekend: the presenting role, the Desert Glow, the entertainment stage, the Launch Pad, the fireworks, a VIP area called the HUB and the free inflatables in the Family Fun Zone.