Running for Rent: Nike Holds LES Sprint Race With $4,000 Prizes

New Yorkers gathered on Manhattan’s Lower East Side and ran like rent was due, literally. Nike put $4,000 on the line for the fastest man and woman at its WHO RUNS NYC street race Saturday, Aug. 29, turning a 100-meter sprint into a competition where the prize could cover a month of rent for some New Yorkers.

The race took place on Orchard Street outside LAAMS at 74 Orchard St., where runners competed in pre-assigned heats before moving on to relay events.

The timing was hard to miss.

As Straus News previously reported, Manhattan’s median rent reached $5,000 in July, according to rental-market data report.

Nike’s $4,000 prize therefore would not cover the median Manhattan apartment for a month.

But for the two people who won, the money was more than a clever marketing hook.

For Akinola Raymond, it was almost exactly one month’s rent.

Raymond, 32, a senior content creator at advertising agency Gut who lives in StuyTown on the East Side not far from the road race site, said he pays about $3,800 a month. Winning $4,000 meant roughly $200 left over after rent.

“So my rent right now is around, like, $3,800. So I got $200 to spare, but I’ll take it,” Raymond said.

The surprising part is that Raymond does not consider himself a runner.

“I don’t do running. I don’t do run clubs,” he said.

His fiancée found out about the competition through New York’s running-club community and encouraged him to enter. Raymond said he initially had little interest in winning the cash.

“I wanted free stuff from Nike. That was my goal, to get free shoes and clothes and stuff,” he said.

He almost did not run at all.

“I did not want to run the race because I didn’t want to get burnt, but my fiancée convinced me,” Raymond said.

The non-runner turned out to be fast enough.

Raymond plays rugby and works out at the gym five or six times a week. Rugby, he said, has given him plenty of experience sprinting, even though he is not a track athlete.

“I think I’m a pretty fast person for my sport that I play,” he said. “I’m considered very fast, so, like, but I’m not a track athlete.”

He said some of the other competitors appeared to have more experience with running and sprinting clubs, making the victory even more unexpected.

“I was ready to, like, you know, do a sprinting competition. I just did not expect to, like, you know, go that hard,” Raymond said.

Then he won.

“So to win the race and have her believe in me like that, that was pretty cool,” he said.

The $4,000 was a one-time payment, Raymond said, rather than a recurring rent benefit.

Destiny Scott, the women’s winner, also connected the prize to New York’s affordability crisis.

Scott, 26, lives with her mother in East Harlem and contributes $1,000 toward their rent, according to Business Insider.

The publication reported that she viewed the money as helpful as rent continues to rise.

“I hope this brings more attention to how expensive rent is and hopefully can lead to more affordability for people in the city,” Scott told Straus News.

For Scott, the event was also about the running community it brought together.

“It was overall a nice event that brought different running communities together,” she said.

But the race quickly became something bigger online. Some people compared Nike’s rent-centered competition to “The Hunger Games,” questioning whether turning a basic necessity into a prize made the event feel dystopian.

Raymond rejected that comparison.

“This was a free event that Nike ran,” he said, pointing to the Nike products, food vouchers and other perks provided to participants.

“I just wish people would stop calling it the ‘Hunger Games’ or dystopian because it’s the farthest thing from dystopian,” he said.

Scott also said the comparison did not reflect what she experienced at the event.

“People online are referring to this event as some type of ‘Hunger Games,’ but everyone I met did it for fun,” she said.

Nike’s event materials described a competition centered on speed and community. Participants checked in at LAAMS between 11 a.m. and noon, received their heat assignments, bibs, wristbands and food vouchers, and were required to run in their assigned heats. The first race was scheduled for 12:45 p.m.

For Raymond, the race started with his fiancée telling him to enter and ended with an unexpected $4,000 payday.

For Scott, it was a win she never expected.

“I didn’t expect to win, but I’m happy I did,” she said.

And although $4,000 won’t solve New York’s housing crisis, it can make the next rent payment a little easier.

“Either way, rent will get paid, but it was nice to win the money to help,” Scott said.