Run Across America - 23rd June - Day 10

This morning we awoke in Las Vegas (just off the strip) for our day off. I was a little stiff after completing my last running section at 105degrees near Nevada yesterday, but we were all too excited looking forward to the Ricky Hatton fight in the evening time at the Thomas and Mack Center. There were around 10,000 British fans swarming the Strip with all the Man City Football shirts just to clarify who they were and where they came from. The Ricky Hatton fans were just first class and showed the Americans how to support a fellow countryman.

On to the daytime and it was a nightmare morning/afternoon as we had to take our RV to a garage in Las Vegas because it was playing up and just drinking the gas more than it should have. We discovered when we got there that the RV had a few problems, so we had to transfer to an older but more reliable RV instead. It took a few hours to arrange and was a waste of our day off.

The fight night was just as I expected an easy win for Ricky Hatton, but more easily than I anticipated with a 4th round TKO. The atmosphere was terrific and having fans like Ricky Hatton’s it’s no wonder he never loses. It was like being at the MEN arena in Manchester but just a few thousands miles away and much hotter. I also met up with my girl Annie’s brother (Glenn) who lives in Palm Springs, he was just standing by the bar and I saw this baldy head and it was him (it was quite random).

I was given a couple of aftershow boxing tickets, which was held at the Wynn Hotel and Casino (very plush). The decision had to be made of who was going to accompany me to the party, and after a little discussion Natasha was decided. The party was far better than I expected, firstly walking into a big ballroom with around 1000 people in attendance I didn’t know if there would be anybody I might know, but then at the back of the room there was a VIP roped off section with all the big names in view. I spoke to a newspaper reporter from ‘The Times’ and he got both of us in. Once in we had pictures with Ricky Hatton, Wayne Rooney, Bryan Robson and a few other names (check out the gallery). Ricky, Wayne and Bryan all said I was a crazy lad for attempting to run across America, but at least they were listening to my brief conversion. Once we got the pictures and I had a chat to some boxing people I knew, we then both headed over to Caesars Palace to meet up with the others and show them the pictures we had got. Natasha also had a picture with Coleen (Rooney’s girlfriend) who was a great girl and seemed very down to earth.

The day started off very bad but ended up being one of the best I could have hoped for. I would like to apologise to the boys for taking Natasha and not you but it was the best decision made (sorry).

PS -I’m sorry that my thumb is up on each picture, but sometimes I don’t realise until after.

Regards

Jackson and Team