This past weekend I experienced one of the perks of going to an MBA program on the west coast - Challenge 4 Charity weekend in Palo Alto, CA! Stanford GSB hosted the incredible event - quite a logistical feat in and of itself.
The two-day event features a comprehensive athletic competition involving students from 9 west coast MBA programs. Over 1,000 MBAs descended upon Stanford's campus to partake in 26 different events, from more traditional sports like football, basketball, tennis and soccer to less traditional events like dodgeball, dance/cheer, and bocce ball. C4C weekend has a tradition of being an all-around fun and social event. Everyone's in a great mood and school spirit is high. There was lots of good-spirited cheering and a copious amount of high fives to go around.
One of the features of the event was Battle of the Bands. The display of talent was incredible and each of the bands brought some serious fire power. My jaw dropped when I heard one of my classmates do a bang up job singing "Billie Jean". He definitely brought the house down!
I know you all are wondering about results...yes, UCLA Anderson came in 1st in the sports competition! (and USC won in the overall contest which included fundraising and volunteer hours) I personally had a blast participating in the tennis and dodgeball contests. 3 days of full-body muscle soreness was definitely worth it.
Random side note: former LA Laker Mark "Mad Dog" Madsen is a 2nd year student at Stanford GSB. Not surprisingly, their basketball team won the whole thing. My guess is that he was probably playing at 30% effort too. Definitely a nice guy - he had several opportunities to dunk, and chose not to. If I were 6'9" and athletic, it would take a lot of self control to pass up on a dunking opportunity!
I am definitely looking forward to C4C weekend 2012 and hope to see a lot of you there next year...see below for some of our team pictures.
- Jesse Ferlianto '12
UCLA Anderson Dodgeball - 3rd place
UCLA Tennis - 2nd place
