A Caltech tradition, the object of which is to eat at the original Tommy's in downtown LA and return before you left. This can be done once a year, in the middle of the night when daylight saving time returns to standard time.

The keys to a successful Negative Time Tommy's Run are:

  1. A car with good suspension, in order to drive down the curvy Arroyo Seco section of the Pasadena Freeway at a reasonable speed.
  2. Leaving Tech as late as possible, i.e., shortly before daylight saving time ends. This gives you the maximum amount of time to get to Tommy's, order, and eat, before you have you get back.
  3. Leaving Tech as early as possible, in order to spend less time waiting in line behind a few hundred other Caltech students.
#2 and #3 must be properly balanced in order to achieve negative time.