Bed Race teams spoke with The Brown and White about why they are participating in this Rivalry Week tradition and what it means to the Lehigh community.
Q: Why are you participating in Bed Races?
BLT (Best Lehigh Team):
Kaitlyn Hemmer, ‘29: We’re freshmen, so we really wanted to get involved. On every single tour we all went on, they pretty much said the most fun part was Rivalry Week, especially Bed Races.
Team Madagascar:
Margaret Horn, ‘26: We’re seniors, so we’re getting involved one last time, soaking in the rest of our Lehigh experience.
Team DNGE(R):
Aidan Latourette, ‘27: We’re all on the cross country and track and field team, and we have another team doing it, so it’s kind of a friendly competition between us.
Team Lab Rats:
Trinity Trainor, ‘26: It’s a tradition. We did it sophomore year and it was really fun, and we liked the tradition of it all.
Team Party Animals:
Luca Mandiya, ‘26: We’re actually the champions from last year, so we’d say it’s to reclaim the title.
Team Marching 97:
Sean Hetzel, ‘28: We thought it would be fun, and the Marching 97 I don’t believe has ever had a team before officially, so we thought it’d be fun to represent our band.
Team Women’s Rugby:
Katie Carlson, ‘26: It’s super great to be part of the community at Lehigh, and we wanted to do it as a team since we’re on the women’s rugby team all together.
Team Rolling Admissions:
Frank Lomax, ‘27: It’s a lot of hype going on around a Wednesday night and it’s cold, but nobody cares. We’re feeling the warmth from the community. How could you not want to be involved?
Team Phi Sigma Pi National Honors Academic Fraternity:
Billy Melvin, ‘26: We represent our academic fraternity, and we wanted to represent it in a really fun way and get our name out there. We’re here to compete. We’re here to win.
Q: Why is Bed Races important to the Lehigh community?
BLT (Best Lehigh Team):
Hemmer: It’s cool to see everybody here supporting in spirit. I also love the history behind it, the fact that it’s so deeply rooted in engineering and the culture it brings together.
Team Madagascar:
Maddy Bavaro, ‘26: Lehigh is such a great community because people from all walks of life come together and want to socialize with each other and get to know people. We’ve been walking around and introducing ourselves and meeting new people, so it’s just been a very fun thing to do.
Team DNGE(R):
Latourette: It’s something unique. You don’t see things like this at other colleges. I just asked if Lafayette does this, and they don’t. It’s one of those weird things that’s unique to Lehigh.
Team Lab Rats:
Petra Oganovich, ‘26: There’s not really events like this all the time. It’s not a Greek event or a sports event, so I feel like everybody can participate.
Team Party Animals:
Mandiya: It’s a great tradition that’s been going on for a long time, and it keeps up with the Le-Laf traditions and keeps everyone excited for the game.
Team Women’s Rugby:
Jenna Martucci, ‘28: It’s something to look forward to when the days get shorter and the sun goes down earlier. Especially in November, the semester’s about to wrap up and so just looking forward to something is always nice.
Team Rolling Admissions:
Drew Smith, ‘27: I think it’s a symbol of the Lehigh spirit, especially going into the Rivalry Week. This is extraordinarily stupid and we are showing up and showing out and having a ton of fun just because we can.
Team Phi Sigma Pi National Honors Academic Fraternity:
Rebecca Caporaso, ‘28: It brings us together as a community. I’ve never seen more people together from all of the grades and all of different majors and minors, all brought together in the same place.
Q: What was your inspiration for your team name and costume?
Team DNGE(R):
Latourette: We just put the first letter of all of our names together, and it was D N G E. So we were a team, Danger, and we just put the R in parentheses.
Team Madagascar
Ruhi Tawde, ‘26: Honestly, childhood movies. It’s very nostalgic (with) seniors looking back, and we’ve become such good friends over the past few years that it’s nice to do something as a cohesive unit.
Team Lab Rats:
Trainor: Most of us are STEM majors, so we’re lab rats. We’re scientists.
Team Rolling Admissions:
Lucas Koranda, ‘26: We’re the admissions tour guides, so our team name is rolling admissions, and we’re representing all of admissions here tonight.
Q: What do you love about Bed Races?
Team DNGE(R):
Derek Coceano, ‘27: Spending time with our teammates and friends outside the classroom. It’s good to get to know everyone better and do things that are fun and not necessarily academic.
Team Marching 97:
Jack Jewison, ‘28: I love the environment, a lot of people, a lot of creativity and it brings the whole campus together out of here.
Team Women’s Rugby:
Carlson: Schools that don’t have these traditions, they miss them, and you don’t necessarily realize how much fun it is until it’s your last year.
Q: Why is the Rivalry Week tradition important to the Lehigh community?
Team Madagascar
Emma Valle, ‘26: Lehigh is a very generational school and you have traditions that are passed down from grandparents and parents whose kids are also now here. So, it’s something that really bonds alumni through all rights of their Lehigh experience and allows the community to come together and bond over something that is so important at an academic school, to have social life and traditions like this.
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