When Joel Tse and Amanda Hughes found that the venue they wanted for their wedding was available only on the day they were running a half marathon, they did what most fanatics would: They invited their whole party to race with them.
For the couple, who met while training for the New York City Marathon, there was no better way to kick off their marriage than with Saturday’s 13.1-mile Airbnb Brooklyn Half Marathon to Coney Island.
“We had this thought of, ‘Would it be crazy to do this?’” says Hughes, a 38-year-old video editor. “But, actually, it would be crazy not to.”
Saturday morning at 7, the Boerum Hill couple and 55 of their 190 wedding guests began the race as a group: Hughes in a white tank and running skirt, Tse in a black tank and bow tie, and everyone in blue singlets. By 9:45 a.m., most of them — including one guest who was pregnant — had crossed the finish line. Then the couple rushed home to shower and get ready for the 5:30 p.m. ceremony.
Surprisingly, Tse says, most of the guests who ran got a second wind, and stayed until after midnight.
“We packed so much into this one day,” says Tse, a 39-year-old who works for an art insurance firm. “But it felt fantastic. It reinforced how important the running community is to us.”
Turns out, asking their guests to run wasn’t such a stretch. Only about four of those who accepted the challenge, including Los Angeles visitor Morgan Russo, were running their first half marathon.
“I thought they were crazy, but also it made perfect sense,” says Russo, 36, who knows Hughes from work. “When they said they were doing this, I thought, ‘Damn it, I guess I’m running a half marathon.’ ”
Many of the couple’s guests are friends from the running community. Tse recalls the first time he saw his future wife, after completing a training route for 2009’s NYC Marathon.
“The first interaction I had with Amanda was when she gave me a high five,” he says with a laugh. “At the time it was just an awesome high five — she was seeing someone and I started dating someone else shortly after that, so we were just friends.”
Even so, the two became running buddies, and got to know each other well on long-distance runs in Prospect Park or Brooklyn Bridge Park. With every mile, Hughes says, they let down their guard more and focused on each other.
“We’ve had our most serious conversations about what we want in life while on runs,” she says.
‘If you run a half marathon with [your wedding guests], you have a whole bunch of quality time with them.’
- Amanda Hughes, bride
After nearly five platonic years, they started dating in 2014. During one run, the two talked about moving in together. Later, the topic turned to marriage. Tse proposed to Hughes in Terminal C of Newark Airport when they flew to Atlanta to visit her family.
As they began planning their wedding a year ago, they ran into a scheduling conflict: Their top choice, the Greenpoint Loft in Brooklyn, was available only on May 20, 2017, the same day as the half marathon they wanted to run. To race or to wed?
“We thought about it for maybe a minute,” Tse says, “and realized this was actually pretty fortuitous.”
“Yeah, it really couldn’t be more appropriate,” Hughes adds. “This is the community that brought us together in the first place.”
When they sent out their invitations, they asked if guests were interested in running the morning of the wedding. They also promised to run a little slower than usual to keep up with runners less experienced than they are.
As both wedding and race approached, Tse sent out forms for the prospective runners to fill out, along with coaching guides and a reminder to sign up. It worked: The race sold out in just under 30 minutes — “It was like we were getting tickets for Beyoncé,” Tse says — and all their guests made it in.
One of them, Judith Ackerman, flew in from Denver. She met the bride and groom when she lived in Brooklyn and ran with them there.
“Our running community is our family,” says Ackerman, 42. “So it felt so fitting to their relationship and our love for them to run as a group.”
Looking back on what turned out to be an 18-hour day, the newlyweds say the race helped them bond with their loved ones in a meaningful setting.
“People always say you won’t have a chance during your wedding to spend time with your guests,” Hughes says. “But if you run a half marathon with them, you have a whole bunch of quality time with them.”
