Cypress Ridge HOLA Club opened up with a tremendous dance performance hyping up the crowd at the annual homecoming pep rally Friday, Oct. 14.

HOLA Club is a Hispanic cultural organization that started in 2004. It has become one of the school’s’ most popular clubs with nearly 100  students joining every year.

Senior, Dulce Frias, has been apart of HOLA Club for two and a half years and performed in the pep rally with loads of enthusiasm.

“I was super nervous like, I was shaking while I was dancing with Brandon,” Frias said.

This is the first time HOLA performed since 2014, but the group was more than prepared to please the crowd. HOLA performed at the first and second pep rally.

“When we first performed we were like ‘aw we messed up’, but no one noticed cause we kept a smile while we were performing and by the second pep rally we weren’t as nervous and improved by a lot,” Frias said.

During the pep rally, HOLA created a mix of Hispanic themed songs to perform embracing their heritage in pride. Since HOLA has a great amount of seniors in their organization, they decided to do the pep rally “senior themed” by having all seniors come together, along with a few sophomores.

 Seniors Frías, Emily Flores, Veronica Vasquez, and sophomore Bryan Cornejo all choreographed the dance performances at the pep rally.

Cornejo is the main choreographer for HOLA’s dance team. Cornejo is one of the first sophomores to become one of HOLA’s dance instructors and lead the pep rally in a great performance.

“There were choreography auditions and I was kind of nervous,” Cornejo said. “I didn’t know if I wanted to audition at first, so I asked my friend and she said it’d be a great idea, so I went for it.”

Cornejo did a phenonmenal job starting off the HOLA dance team. He performed an amazing solo with sophomore Madeleine Galindo as they perform a traditional salsa dance running in Cornejo’s arms as he flips her in front and back of his body leveled at the waist.

Galindo, just joined HOLA Club this year and has not really performed in front of a huge audience, so this was a really great experience for her.

“I was really nervous cause this was my first time ever performing in front of a lot of people, but my boyfriend Brandon convinced me to do, so I did and it was totally worth it,” said Galindo.

HOLA Club also had their clothing staged out by Brandon Lopez and Frias.

“We just all decided to go to the mall and pick out the outfits all together even though we weren’t supposed to,” Frias states with a slight giggle.

The guy dancers performed in a black V-neck shirts, while the girls wore grey V-necks with dark jeans and black shoes.

HOLA perform a lot within the club from volunteer events to dance competitions and of course the talent show. If you haven’t had a chance to see them perform, they’ll be more opportunities.

Frias believes the more they perform the better the dance team will improve as a whole.

“I thought the pep rally was good for us as a whole because it’ll prepare us for competition and we’ll know what to expect,” Frias said.