Answering the call to join in a Lehigh tradition, fellow Gryphons for Singleton, Hitch and Maida houses decided to compete in this year’s Bed Races along Packer Avenue in the heart of the Asa Packer campus.
My friend Justin and I decided to join the team since it's our senior year. During the required information session for participants, our team, consisting of five members, had come to realize we were supposed to come up with costumes. Since we had settled on The Straw Hats (based off the anime “One Piece”), our costumes were pirate-themed.
Justin dressed as Luffy. I was Ace.
Hundreds of spectators lined Packer Avenue for this year’s Bed Races, a highlight of the activities that precede The Rivalry football game between Lehigh and Lafayette. As part of the competition, a team of four to five students push and drive a modified bed to a finish line to show their Lehigh spirit.
When I arrived at the Bed Races on this November evening, there was color and chaos everywhere.
Costumes flooded the scene, so finding my team was a challenge. Once I did, my team members and I realized we were the second race of the night. We decided to make a last-minute member switch with another Gryphon team to balance out the overall weight of our crew.
Our team, The Straw Hats, walked to the starting position, as the song “All the Way Up” by Fat Joe and Remy Ma played on the speakers. At the starting line, we requested our song change to “The Wellerman” by Nathan Evans from the show “One Piece.”
The process was moving so fast, we’d hardly had any time to mentally prepare. I held the rail of the bed with Justin and one other member and we ran, pushing the bed that held two other teammates.
Unfortunately for me, I had miscalculated how fast I could run. The two other members pushing the bed were running faster than me and I couldn’t keep up. Despite knowing that the consequence for letting go of the bed was disqualification, I let go and fell hard.
I was okay, though I bruised my knees. My pride hurt a lot more. I grabbed my hat and ran toward the finish line with the rest of my team. Everything was so fast. The race lasted about a minute.
There was some deliberation from the judges, but The Straw Hats ultimately lost the race.
The reality, like in “One Piece,” is that no one ever won without getting busted up in the process. A loss is always disappointing, but the best part of the event was knowing that my senior year would be capped off with a good story to tell. I try not to take anything too seriously and although my fall was admittedly embarrassing, my friends and I get a good laugh thinking about it. Through my time here, I’ve seen the joy in the camaraderie of The Rivalry. We don’t all know each other, but we do know we love seeing Lehigh come out on top.
I lost the race as Lehigh lost the game this year, but the week leading up to it is always fun. Don’t think too hard about joining in on the festivities, just do it.
While I recommend knee pads for next year’s contestants, I recommend making the most of your time in college just as much. My time at Lehigh has been defined by my friendships and memories (besides the education of course). I have no idea who I’ll still talk to in 10 years, but I’ll always have stories to tell about my time here.