How Take the Bridge flipped the script in urban road races

Anthony Crouchelli didn't know where he was going when he started the 9th annual Take the Bridge race at 8:30 on a Thursday night in July. These are the conditions when you enter an unsanctioned competition. For those who haven't had a taste, Take the Bridge riffs on alleycat racing, where the start and checkpoints are kept secret until race day. There are no roadblocks or aid stations – just along side streets, intersections and yes, bridges (think road racing meets parkour). Runners can follow any course as long as they reach the checkpoints in the predetermined order.

Getting lost was not an option. So, GoPro in hand and a smile stretching from the Bronx to the local stomping grounds of Hoboken, Crouchelli doubled down on his strategy: take advantage of the home field.

He was with some guys from the Boogie Down Bronx Runners, a local club that co-hosted the race and the 5 Hour ENERGY and Men's Magazineto press some shortcuts.

As they made their way through Marble Hill to Inwood, runners got creative. They rode weed-smelling elevators, ran through subway stations, and jumped gutters all the way to the George Washington Bridge. Take the Bridge has never before faced the GW, a nearly mile-long suspension bridge that connects Upper Manhattan and Fort Lee, NJ; and they have never organized a competition in the city center until now.

About 100 runners gathered for the event, many representing running clubs in the Bronx and Upper Manhattan. Founded in 2017 by Lenny Grullon, Boogie Down's mission is to inspire “non-runners” to lace up and hit the streets.

Grullon, an instructor and father of four, said before the race that when Take the Bridge founder Darcy Budworth approached him about co-hosting, he suggested he start closer to GWB. Grullon countered that if his club wanted to participate, he wanted to make the Bronx a major part of the competition. Budworth agreed, and they planned a roughly 10,000-long route from the Bronx through the GWB and back to the Bronx Public, a gastropub that doubled as the race center.

For the past nine years, Budworth has run Take the Bridge from Los Angeles to Maine, and another in Paris last June. Known for being fast, they attract runners who are not just elite, but daring enough to weave in and out of traffic, navigate darkened streets and jump over barricades if it means shaving a few meters off the course. .

For Grullon, it was of utmost importance that the Bronx edition be inclusive of his community. Many Boogie Down runners are new to running and worry that they might not be welcome at the event. Budworth told him that's exactly what he envisioned for the Jubilee race—runners hitting sub-6-minute miles and others running 12-minute miles.

“Then I'm sold,” Grullon said. “Let's go for it.”

True to tradition, the competition was won by two local elite and veteran alley-oops: a track coach from New Jersey named Kyle Price and a pediatric oncology nurse named Lindsey Renaud. As with all alley races, their times were somewhat irrelevant given that everyone took a slightly different route. In fact, Price ran 7.12 miles, while Renaud clocked closer to 7 flats.

Among the 100 finishers was Keaton Kustler, a runner from Los Angeles who ran the first Take the Bridge in December 2022. It was pretty awful, he recalled. Lost in downtown LA, had to pee in a bush and thought, “That sucks.”

But something about the experience—the do-it-yourself spirit, the sense of danger—reminded Kustler of the punk shows he attended as a teenager in his native Boston, so he signed up for another contest in March 2023. Two months later, he competed in The Speed ​​Project, an unsanctioned 340-mile relay from Santa Monica, CA to Las Vegas, NV. Kustler was hooked.

Contrary to Grullon's perception that Take the Bridge only attracts elite athletes, Kustler embodies the spirit of the series. He started running five years ago to break a years-long cycle of depression and unemployment brought on by a near-fatal car accident. In 2015, he was part of recording artist Twin Shadow's road crew when the tour bus was rear-ended by a semi, causing the tail of the bus to fly into the air before falling back with such force that it fractured Kustler's T12 vertebra.

Although Kustler was never athletic as a child, unsanctioned racing appealed to his rebellious nature and presented a strategic challenge. Most of all, he felt drawn to the community of the LA run club scene.

“Running is the new skateboarding,” he said.

Speed ​​was never a priority for him. He finished his first half-marathon in 2:37 and came close to last at the first two Take the Bridges. So when someone yelled at him on GWB that he was in the 4th position, Kustler summoned everything he had. became 3rd. It was the first time he had put anything in there.

Crouchelli averaged 6:49 over 7.08 miles — faster than he expected. He said he was inspired when Price high-fived him as he returned on the bridge after hitting the checkpoint on the Jersey side. Crouchelli started doing the same, hitting the hands of nearly 100 runners that night.

“It felt a bit like a Liberty Mutual commercial,” he joked after the race.

As Crouchelli mingled with the other runners over wings and beer, he captured many of their stories with his GoPro. He spoke with Kustler about his running journey, met a young man who recently moved back in with his parents and uses running as an escape from life's daily pressures, and heard from dozens of people about why they decided to tackle the George Washington Bridge on Thursday. July night. No two stories are the same.

For his part, Crouchelli can't wait to host another race — especially if it's in the Bronx.

“The uptown running culture is so accepting and friendly and warm,” she said. “But it also has this fire and spark and magnetic energy where every step you take feels alive and connected and purposeful.”

As Grullon agrees, it's hard to think of a better reason to thread.

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