A recap: Green City Challenge

Benay Wynerib, left, and Kyle Bullen won the second running of the Green City Challenge.

Maybe it was the fact that he was only competitor from last year's inaugural event. Maybe it was the addition of a new teammate. Whatever the reason, Kyle Bullen won the second running of the Green City Challenge in Manhattan last Sunday (Oct. 23) alongside his teammate, Benay Vynerib.

“Benay was my key,” Bullen would say later with a laugh as the sky began to darken above the north plaza of Union Square. “We just had a good day,” Vynerib added.

Bullen and Vynerib -- who both work at Candle 79, an organic vegan restaurant and eco-cocktail lounge near 79th and Lexington Avenue -- finished the race at approximately 2:45 p.m. after zigzagging throughout Manhattan on a pair of bikes to seven different challenges as one of 10 duos participating in the event’s second edition.

 

Kyle Bullen and Benay Wynerib strike a pose with the spoils from winning the Green City Challenge on Oct. 23.

After every challenge was completed, teams were awarded a puzzle piece with a clue about their next destination. Eventually, their path led them back to Union Square, where they had to assemble the puzzle in 30 seconds.

“There was no rhyme or reason. Last year it was very circular,” said Bullen, whose team finished third last October. “It was more of a path, but this year it was very all over the place… which was all right because we got good exercise.”

And what were some of those challenges the two faced? Well, there was “Compost Jeopardy,” in which competitors took turns answering questions about composting (“I’ll take ‘worms,’ for 400, Alex.”). Then there was a challenge that involved cleaning a pit of city trees and a “seed ball challenge,” where contestants tried to make five dried-out seed balls -- consisting of clay, wildflower seeds and fertilizer -- as quickly as possible before tossing them into a vacant parking lot.  “It’s like urban guerilla gardening,” said John Messerschmidt, one of the event’s organizers who played the role of “supreme puzzle master.”

Messerschmidt pointed out that two of this year’s challenges, the tree pit and seed ball challenges, were run by last year’s winners, Dan Tainow and Helen Ho. Last year’s inaugural challenge, which started at La Plaza Cultural Community Center in the East Village and ended at Solar One on the East River, had only 10 vendors. On Sunday, 30 vendors set up displays for passers-by to peruse all day. “It’s good for us because everybody needs something to do during the day,” he added about the event’s increased visibility given the high amount of foot traffic through the square.

 

The challengers gathered a puzzle piece -- with a clue on the back -- at each one of seven local eco-friendly businesses...

and then had 30 seconds to assemble the puzzle at the end.

Les Judd, an environmental activist who runs Green Boroughs, founded the Green City Challenge in early 2010 after watching an episode of “The Amazing Race,” in which a contestant, who was vegetarian, was knocked out of the race for failing to eat a “horrible meat dish.”

“I said to my wife, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could have an event like this in New York City, but it would promote how to live, work and eat green?' So that’s how it all came about,” Judd said. He has hopes of one day hosting an environmental-aimed film series, workshops, panel discussions -- and taking away pieces of the challenge and sharing it with local schools.

On a scale of 1 to 10 on the scale of green living, Bullen and Wynerib claimed to be 10s -- but only as far as the big city would allow them. Still, they picked up new knowledge on a variety of other aspects of green movement, citing in particular an eye-opening challenge about green dry cleaning at Green Apple Cleaners.

“As two people who live extremely green for this particular city, you learn of details that just adds to you being more green and helping more people be more green,” Bullen said. “You’re a 10 to a capacity in New York and you can’t go very far with the infrastructure that is in place.”

“There’s always room for improvement,” Judd added, “even if you like you’re super green, there’s always things you can learn, things you can do better.”

Do you check out the event on Sunday? If so, what were your thoughts? We'd love to hear from you.

Comments

[Donna Cicale]

This looks like it was a blast! Would make a great tv show a la Amazing Race.