Over the weekend, Manchester hosted the Great City Games, with the World Lacrosse Championships taking part.
On Saturday, the official Championships mascot, Chester the Bulldog, was on hand to help warm up the participants in the Junior Great Manchester Run. Once he had seen them off, Chester was called into action to compete in the Mascot Race at Sports City. After getting off to a slow start, he battled back to finish second, ahead of Manchester City’s mascot, Moonchester, and the mascot for UK Athletics.
Later in the day, three of England’s World Lacrosse Championship squad raced on the same track on which Usain Bolt smashed the world record last year. The team were congratulated and interviewed by athletics stars Linford Christie, Darren Campbell and Iwan Thomas.
The England squad members highlighted their quest for funding to compete in the Championships. It is estimated that each member of the squad needs to raise £1000 to pay for things such as equipment and travel to represent their country.
Four other England squad members, Nick Anderton, David McCulloch, Andrew Baxter and Paul Ryan, all competed in the BUPA Great Manchester Run, running 10 kilometres in their effort to raise funding. The players all ran in full Lacrosse kit, even with their sticks, but this didn’t slow them down as they finished the 10k in good time.
The squad are now stepping up their intense training schedule with only seven weeks until the start of the Championships. They returned last week from a successful tour of the USA, in which they faced a number of current USA players. In a tough final game, they faced beaten Major League Lacrosse finalists, the Denver Outlaws. The exhilarating final minute saw the Outlaws squeeze home 7 – 6 and held on as the England Team pressured them all over the field to level the game.
Only 2,500 seats now remain available to the public for the World Lacrosse Championships. Season Passes and a Final Four Day Ticket Package are on sale and will secure your seat at the Final Match in addition to over 100 more World Class lacrosse matches. Day tickets are also available and are on sale at http://www.2010worldlacrosse.com/tickets
