Judging by the cheers, hollers, and whoops that echoed at lunch today through Palo Alto High School’s Big Gym, this year’s Spirit Week is going to be full of energy.

The main events for the rally were Hungry-Hungry Hippos and a dance battle. For Hungry-Hungry Hippos, the seniors snagged a victory by three balls with a total score of 52 balls, while the freshmen came in last with a score of 24 balls.

The dance-off pitted freshmen against sophomores and juniors versus seniors. The sophomores beat the freshmen and the seniors snagged a victory against the juniors. In the final round, the seniors won over the crowd with their dance moves and brought victory to their class.

Sophomore Tessa Berney said she thought the sophomores got snubbed for their win in the dance-off. 

“I thought it was really fun, but the sophomores were definitely robbed during the breakdancing competition because our person did a backflip and they [the seniors] didn’t do one,” Berney said. 

Freshman Arnav Shah said his first rally experience was really entertaining and he would definitely go to another one. 

“I loved the rally,” Shah said. “It was cool to see all the other grades compete in the challenges, and it was just fun to spend time with friends. I would recommend [people] to go to another one.”

According to senior Sean Gustavson, he believed that the high turnout contributed to the lively atmosphere. 

“I think we’ve had a lot of other better rallies,” Gustavson said. “However, I appreciate that this one is at lunch instead of at the end of the day, because I feel like at the end of the day you just kind of lose a lot of people.”

Currently, the Spirit Week scoreboard is as follows:

4,500 pts for seniors

3,400 pts for juniors

3,200 pts for sophomores

2,200 pts for freshmen