Broadway Bomb
About The Bomb
Everything you need to know before you drop in, straight from the people who show up every year.
← Back to the main pageRace Day Basics
The Broadway Bomb takes place the third Saturday of October every year. The race begins at 12 pm on the dot, at W. 116th and Riverside Dr, without exception.
If you are late, you're encouraged to join the group at Columbus Circle (although you can find us anywhere along Broadway). The race starts with a mad dash up the hill towards Broadway, and once we reach Broadway the group rides all the way down south to the Bull statue near Wall St.
A Little History
The Broadway Bomb was founded in October 2002 by Ian Nichols and Fred Mahe, who set out with sixteen riders to see if they could survive the full length of Broadway in one push. It grew every year after that, and by 2012 thousands of riders were showing up for it.
That same year, a New York Supreme Court injunction declared the race unlawful, and the NYPD began showing up in force to try to shut it down. It didn't work. The race has run every third Saturday of October since, exactly as it never officially should.
In 2011, filmmaker Joe Goodman documented the race and the longboard culture around it in a film called Push Culture: The Broadway Bomb, if you want to see what the early years looked like. A new documentary, simply titled Broadway Bomb, is currently in the works from filmmakers EmmaJane Bauer and Gonzo. It is set to release in 2027.
The route has stayed the same since the beginning: a straight shot down Broadway, roughly 8 miles from Morningside Heights to the Financial District, run on open city streets with real traffic the whole way.
A Word of Caution
Because the Bomb has never had a single official owner outside of its original founders, it's occasionally attracted bad actors who have tried to take it from the founders who actually built it. These same bad actors have had plans to take this event away through official government paperwork in order to make a profit off the name and event. At the end of the day, we are just a bunch of skaters, trying to make ends meet, and taking life day by day, until this holiest of days comes around and we are surrounded by a community of fellow free spirits. No piece of paper can take away what was always free. Broadway Bomb has always been by the people, for the people.
Ian Nichols is the only original co‑founder still active in running the race today, and the day‑to‑day work is delegated out to a small group of verified, official channels, not to any one person claiming to speak for the whole thing.
If someone tells you they're in charge, asks you to pay for anything tied to the Bomb, or tries to steer it toward their own name or brand, that's not what this race is about. It belongs to everyone who shows up and rides.
When in doubt, trust the verified channels below, and nobody else.
