February 25, 2025

20,000 People in Downtown Boston Show Up For Red Bull Heavy Metal

Benny Milam and Jess Perlmutter win big in front of the crowd!

words: Mark Clavin

Plenty of numbers were getting tossed around estimating the size of the crowd with everything from 30,000+ to 10,000, but the official word is putting it right around 20,000. All said and done, to pull off a massive event in Boston with just a handful of snowballs thrown at camera operators and a bit of shoving in the congestion is quite the feat! Not to mention, there was no real damage besides a few riders that went down hard, with just about every square inch of climbable public property scaled to get a glimpse at all the action going down in City Hall Plaza. There were probably a few arrests, but we only saw one guy get dragged away as he jumped into the street to try and get an autograph from Zeb.

Red Bull Heavy Metal had a huge turnout and put on quite the show for the fans decked out in Bruins and Celtics gear. Thanks to the Mayor’s approval, not a single snowboarder was kicked out for riding the famous ledges and stairs surrounding the office. By now you have seen plenty of the viral videos floating around of Zeb Powell, Jess Perlmutter, and Lucas Magoon getting down on the features, so here is a massive photo dump from Clavin on all the action with some bullet points for major takeaways.

  • Zone 1 champs: Jess Perlmutter and Zeb Powell. (Pat Fava and Jaylen Hanson took home the runner up spot.)
  • Zone 2 champs: Jess Perlmutter and Benny Milam. (Forgot who took the runner up spots.)
  • Zone 3 champs: Jayva Jordan and Benny Milam. (Maggie Leon and Joey Fava in the runner up position.)
  • Overall champs: You guessed it, the people that each won two separate zones – Benny and Jess.
  • Special shout out to Chris Grenier who looked right at home in the Bruins jersey with fellow Masshole Todd Richards on the mic. (East Coaster Alex Caccamo rounded out the announcing crew keeping the crowd entertained all day).
  • Zeb Powell could probably run for Mayor of Boston after seeing the reaction the crowd had anytime he stepped into view (but the current Mayor seems pretty chill considering she approved the contest to be held outside her office).
  • East Coast and Boston deserves more events like this.
  • Next time they probably need some jumbo trons like they had in Minnesotta for the crowd (we will tell them but they probably are already figuring that one out).
  • Final point: BRING IT BACK TO BOSTON BECAUSE THAT WAS FUN AS HELL.