Wearing anything from booty shorts to butt-less cheetah thongs, jock straps to jockey shorts, more than 300 UC Davis students sprinted across town in their “skivvies“ on Friday night, celebrating the third annual UC Davis Undie Run.
The event was organized by Mike Veliz, a junior studio art major, who decided his first year that UCD should be part of a growing college tradition, already embraced by schools such as San Diego State University, UC Santa Barbara, UC Los Angeles and the University of Texas.
“A friend and I just decided to organize it, and it’s been a pretty big success,” Veliz said. “This is the biggest one we’ve had so far.“
At 8:30 p.m., students began gathering around the flagpole at the Memorial Union, and by 8:45 were ready and fired up to begin the run. As soon as the sprint began, students held onto their bouncing undergarments and charged past Hickey Gym, across Hutchison Field, through Central Park and down B Street, to eventually make a full circle back to the Quad.
After a brief hiatus to cheer on the lagging “undie walk“-ers, and a quick display of school spirit with loud football game cheers, shouts of “to the library!” ushered the crowd to its final stretch: a romp through the normally silent 24-hour reading room.
“I got stuck behind the guys in man thongs,” said Ty Canning, senior psychology major. “But it was a lot of fun – if I was wearing clothes, I would have definitely have felt out of place.“
– Text and photo by MICHELLE IMMEL
