Wigs, Aviators, Body Paint: Chicago’s Green Guys Share Their Race Prep

Every year but one since 2008, John Atchison, a 31-year-old teacher, and at least one friend have completed the Shamrock Shuffle 8K in Chicago as the “Green Guys,” wearing green tights, big curly green wigs, aviators, and not much else—beside kelly-green body paint. 

Like every runner, Atchison has a checklist of essential gear for race morning. His just looks a little different than most. In addition to the requisite safety pins and bottles of Gatorade, he toted six tubs of professional-grade green body paint, three wigs, and a roll of Clorox bleach wipes to his downtown hotel room the night before the race.

The tradition began when Atchison and a friend, Ryan Giuliano, then a student at the University of Illinois, painted themselves for a campus St. Patrick’s Day celebration. They thought it might be fun to wear a similar get-up for the Shuffle. 

Giuliano and another regular Green Guy, Oscar Munoz, couldn’t make the race this year. But Atchison, his wife Brittany, 26, and friend RJ Puoci, also 31, woke up four hours before the 8:30 a.m. gun time to ensure every visible inch of their bodies had a thick enough coat of paint to match their green tights.

For more than an hour and a half, they dunked their hands into a plastic cup of water, then into the tubs of paint, spreading it with quick strokes from their faces to the waistline of their tights. 

This year for the first time they purchased custom tights with “Green Guys” on them. That’s so people will stop calling them the “broccoli” or “asparagus” guys or the Jolly Green Giant. 

They even paint their eyelids, underarms, and inside their ears, despite having wigs and sunglasses as cover. 

Though green drips splashed the hotel bathroom as they worked, a few swipes with the bleach wipes eradicated all evidence of the transformation from regular runners into the local celebrities they’ve become. 

John Atchison has been using the same wig since 2008. And the sunglasses shield their eyes from the sun—and the camera flashes. Nearly every runner they pass asks for a snap, said Puoci’s 30-year-old girlfriend, Kate Sassatelli, who cheers the group on and often ends up serving as the unofficial photographer. (Atchison said he once tried to count the number of times he posed and stopped somewhere around 1,000.)

On the way to the start, the Green Guys stopped to pose for a photo with Olympian Desiree Linden. 

This year, race organizers gave the Atchisons and Puoci elite status and started them in the front of the pack. 

The Green Guys have appeared in race brochures, local TV news spots, and on billboards and bus ads, among other spots. And when they walked into the race expo Saturday, a giant wall-sized photo of their faces greeted them. 

The three finished in 41:19. Not that the normally competitive runners—they’ve each completed at least one Ironman triathlon, and John Atchison has a marathon PR of 2:57:22—cared much about their time. “When we’re green, none of us wear a watch,” he said.

After the race? It takes four to five showers to completely de-green.