The Boardwalk's Second Saturday in May
The RBC Brooklyn Half is the country's largest half marathon and the only one that finishes at the ocean. The race starts inside Prospect Park, threads down Flatbush, dives under Prospect Heights via the underpass, and runs the length of Ocean Parkway before turning hard onto the boardwalk for the last seven-tenths of a mile. The first finishers cross around 8:30; the bulk of the field finishes between 9:30 and 11. By a little after eleven, the boardwalk west of the Wonder Wheel looks like a slow-motion migration of foil-blanketed runners walking in the same direction at the same gentle, ruined pace.
That migration has a destination. Most of the formal post-race "village" is corralled inside the MCU Park area for racers with bibs only. Friends, family, and anyone walking up from the subway need somewhere else to land. The boardwalk has Nathan's, a few clam shacks, the Wonder Wheel, and exactly one bar that has been doing this since before any of the people drinking in it were born.
What Ruby's Has Been Since 1934
The wood-frame space at 1213 Riegelmann Boardwalk opened in 1934 as the Hebrew National Deli and Bar. In 1972, Rubin "Ruby" Jacobs — a Coney Island kid who'd grown up on the beach in the 1920s and '30s and had already owned a string of bathhouses (Claret's, Bushman, Cook's, Stauch's) and a Manhattan camera shop — bought the lease and re-painted the sign. He ran it as a beach bar until his death in 2000. His daughters, Cindy and Melody Jacobs, have run it since, with the next generation now behind the taps.
The bar itself looks the way a 1934 boardwalk bar should look: dark wood, vintage Coney Island photographs covering most of the wall, a long bar facing the boardwalk's open ocean side, a few stools that face nothing but the Atlantic. The Best of Brooklyn 2026 poll voted it the borough's best beach bar, an award that mostly amounts to admitting it has no real competition. Nothing else here was here in 1934. Ruby's is the last original concession on the boardwalk still operating under its own name.
The Ten A.M. Door
Ruby's normal Saturday hours are 11 to 8. On Brooklyn Half morning, the door opens at 10. There is no charge, no bib check, no list. The post-race window runs until 2 p.m. and the place fills the way an aquarium fills — slowly, in waves, with whichever current happens to be arriving from the finish chute. By 11 every seat at the bar is gone; by noon there's a line for the bathroom that snakes past the door; by 1 the boardwalk-facing rail outside is two-deep with people drinking standing up, medals still around their necks, talking about splits in the gentlest, most apologetic way runners ever talk about anything.
The interior is small enough that a friend can find you in roughly two seconds. The ceiling fans push. The taps are cold. If the weather is cooperating — and on the second Saturday of May it usually is — the back of the bar opens straight onto the boardwalk, which means your pint is technically being drunk over the Atlantic.
How Non-Runners Walk Into It
If you're spectating, this is the easiest finish-line move in New York. The D, F, N, and Q trains all terminate at Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue, which is the actual end of the line — you cannot miss your stop. From the turnstile to the boardwalk is roughly 240 yards through Stillwell's vintage steel-and-glass shed; from the boardwalk entrance to Ruby's door is another four minutes east, walking past the Nathan's original at the corner of Surf and Stillwell (which has been there since 1916, when Nathan Handwerker quit Feltman's down the boardwalk and went into business with $300 and a five-cent hot dog).
Phones are useless for finding people in a moving crowd of 29,000. The standing rule is: meet at Ruby's, by the rail, after you've gotten your medal photo. If you arrive first, order something and watch the boardwalk fill in. The runner finds the bar before the bar finds the runner.
What to Order, In Order
Three drinks, in three sequences, work.
If you ran, the first thing is water — Ruby's keeps a stack of clear plastic cups by the service well; ask, drink two, then order. The first real drink is the coldest draft they have. The tap list rotates but reliably runs through Lagunitas, Allagash, and the bigger Belgians (Duvel, Delirium); on race morning the bartender knows which line is freshest and will tell you if you make eye contact for two seconds.
The second drink is a Bloody Mary. Ruby's makes it with a heavy hand on the horseradish and a celery stalk that looks like it was harvested fifteen minutes ago. It's a classic recovery cocktail for a reason — salt, electrolyte, capsaicin, and just enough alcohol to remind your nervous system that the race is over.
The third drink, if you stay, is a shot of Old Overholt rye and a small cold beer to chase it with. That's the boardwalk's classic 1934 order. You don't need to drink a third drink, but you should at least see somebody do it.
If you want food, the kitchen runs a short menu — burgers, fries, chicken fingers, a fish sandwich. None of it is pretending to be anything. You're meant to take a Nathan's hot dog from up the block first; Ruby's handles the part that comes after.
Why the Boardwalk Lets This One Stay
Ruby's has been on the brink three or four times. In 2010 the city's new boardwalk concessionaire, Zamperla, sent eviction letters to most of the original operators and announced a year-round chain sports bar in Ruby's footprint. Public protest, two summers of one-year leases, and a 2012 deal pulled it back from the edge. Since then the lease has rolled, with renegotiations that always sound terminal in the press and always end with the door reopening the next May.
The reason it keeps surviving is partly love (Coney Island has a vocal preservation lobby) and partly that nothing else fits in the space. The room is shaped like a 1934 deli because it is a 1934 deli. A chain that wanted to operate here would have to build a chain that looks like Ruby's, and at that point you've just rebuilt Ruby's. Easier to leave the Jacobs daughters alone.
Practical notes
- Address: Ruby's Bar & Grill, 1213 Riegelmann Boardwalk, Brooklyn, NY 11224
- Race-day hours: 10 a.m.–2 p.m. for the post-race window (Saturday, May 16, 2026); regular Saturday/Sunday hours 11 a.m.–8 p.m., Monday–Friday 11 a.m.–6 p.m., weather permitting
- Getting there: D, F, N, or Q to Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue (terminal stop); 5-minute walk south to the boardwalk, then 4 minutes east
- What to order: the coldest draft on the list (Lagunitas, Allagash, or whichever Belgian is freshest), the Bloody Mary, a shot of Old Overholt with a small beer back
- Best window: 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on race day — the boardwalk-rail crowd is full but the wait inside is still short
- What to do after: Nathan's hot dog at Surf and Stillwell (since 1916), then walk east along the boardwalk to the Wonder Wheel and the Aquarium, or sit on the beach with your medal and not move
The point
The "right on time" idea isn't that Ruby's is open early on race day — that's only the surface gesture. It's that one place on this boardwalk has been the second-Saturday-of-May meeting point for so long that the meeting now belongs to the place. The medal, the cold first sip, the rail that faces the Atlantic, the photo your friends take of you from the boardwalk side — none of those exist on purpose. They exist because the building stayed. Show up, sit down. The day is already arranged.
Tags: #rubysbargrill #brooklynhalf #coneyisland #boardwalkbar #nyrr #brooklyn #riegelmannboardwalk #stillwellavenue #nycdivebar #atlanticocean #postrace #marathonritual #karpofinds #rightontime #cityislove
Sources consulted: rubysconeyisland.com · events.nyrr.org · tracksmith.com · brooklynpaper.com · en.wikipedia.org · jta.org
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