Despite the freshmen’s strong efforts, the juniors held on to their lead during Spirit Week’s fifth and final lunchtime rally today.

As part of the School Color theme, all of the classes came to school decked out in green, except for the seniors who dressed in camouflage outfits.

The lunchtime rally kicked off with the seniors against the freshmen in the finals of the tricycle race, whose preliminary rounds occurred Thursday. The freshmen got off to an early lead and never gave it back, ultimately winning first place, while the seniors came in a close second. Yesterday’s consolation round determined the juniors’ and sophomores’ respective third and fourth place finishes.

“It was super epic,” freshman Scotty McComas said. “The seniors suck at tricycle riding.”

The next event was a scavenger hunt. One runner from each class went into his or her class’s bleachers and found various items to bring back to his or her designated table. The seniors came in first, the freshmen second, the sophomores third, and the juniors fourth.

“It was a hard-fought battle, but it was worth it in the end,” senior runner Charlie Avis said. “It was a great team effort. Everybody contributed their shoelaces.”

An orange-passing relay race followed this scavenger hunt. Eight participants from each class had to pass two oranges down a line of their teammates using only their necks. The juniors won first place in the event, followed by the seniors in second, the freshmen in third, and the sophomores in fourth.

“It showed junior dominance,” relay participant Scott Alexander said.

Even with the juniors’ lead, the freshmen performed very well in the past few days. They won first place in spirit points in yesterday’s morning rally because of the 131 freshmen who showed up. Today, the freshmen won first place in the tricycle race, second in the scavenger hunt, third in the orange passing, and also earned first place in the cheer war.

Before the rally, Assistant Principal Todd Feinberg warned that students who added inappropriate material to cheers would lose points for their class and risk disciplinary action from the school. Despite this warning, the junior class made inappropriate cheers and had points deducted.

The after-school rally began with a staff dance, during which several members of the faculty danced to “Stayin’ Alive.” Following that, the cheerleaders also went through a dance routine to keep the crowd pumped up during the lull before the rally began in full.

The first activity of the afternoon was a hula hoop contest, in which five boys and five girls from each class joined hands and had to pass four successive hula hoops down the entire line without letting go of each other’s hands. The sophomores and juniors went first, and after a redo because of unclear instructions, the juniors emerged victorious. Next, the seniors and freshmen competed, with the seniors claiming the victory. However, the seniors then lost to the juniors, who were the overall winners of the contest. Seniors came in second, sophomores third, and freshmen fourth.

Then came a tug-of-war competition. Again, five boys and five girls from each class competed, as each side tried to pull a bandana attached to the middle of a long rope past a set of cones. Throughout the contest, the juniors dominated, easily beating both the sophomores and the seniors.

“Our plan was to pull before they could react and that is why we won so quickly,” Lauren Bucolo, one of the junior tug-of-war competitors, said.

The final tally for the tug-of-war event was juniors in first, seniors in second, sophomores in third, and freshmen in fourth.

While those were the only two games at the rally, they were definitely not the last of the competitions. After hula hoops and tug-of-war came the class floats and dances.

First were the freshmen, whose float was that of a tiki bar at the beachfront. The dancers wore light hula attire, and began the routine with a mini-hula dance, before going into the full routine.

The freshmen were very pleased with their performance.

“We kicked a lot of class,” several freshmen dancers said.

Next were the sophomores, who also had a float set at the beachfront, but this float focused on lifeguards, not hula. One of the sophomores dressed in a shark costume and terrorized the rest of the dancers in the opening of the dance, with the theme song from “Jaws” playing in the background.

When the dance started, the shark remained, but as one of the dancers. The shark lasted for about half of the routine, during which she inadvertently frightened her would-be dance partner as a part of the routine. After that, she took off the costume and joined the rest of the dancers.

“I think it went really well,” Sophomore Class President George Brown said about the sophomore dance and float. “A lot of people’s ideas went into this and we made it into something great.”

Third to perform were the juniors, who had a float based off of the third Austin Powers movie, “Goldmember,” as well as a general vibe of the psychedelic seventies. While the juniors didn’t win the overall competition, they were still pleased with how they did.

“Juniors may not have won in points, but we have the most heart,” several of the junior dancers said.

Finally, the seniors presented their float, which was based off of the Emerald City of Oz from the movie “The Wizard of Oz.” The float itself had a giant green head with a moving mouthpiece, through which one of the seniors said a few lines of dialogue in a manner reminiscent of the Wizard himself.

After the head had said its piece, the seniors began with a version of “Over the Rainbow,” as senior Alyssa Burton danced a ballet routine on the float. Soon the music genre changed, and the other dancers joined in.

Halfway through the dance routine, the senior dancers took jabs at the other classes, as several of their members played the roles of the Scarecrow, who represented the sophomores, the Tin Man, who represented the juniors, and the lion, who represented the freshmen. The routine finished with an acrobatic display, including one dancer being tossed into the air and caught, as well as a couple of successive handsprings.

The seniors won the dance and the five senior boys and girls who participated were asked to perform at half-time of the football game later that evening.

“Seniors are imminent win,” senior dancer Andrew Cohen said after the announcement.

The winner of Spirit Week will be announced at the Homecoming Dance, which is from 7:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 25 in the big gym.

To see the videos of each class’s spirit dance routines, please visit http://voice.paly.net/view_story.php?id=7320.