Most of them don't look like this. Jimmy's been sparring everyday at 3:30. A local martial arts studio has been bringing guys in. Tough guys but not great boxers. Two of them have come the first two days - they were huffing and puffing pretty good after a couple of rounds but mostly from not relaxing. It's tough getting in with a pro fighter and not knowing what to expect. They were a little more relaxed the second day and the sparring went pretty well. Jimmy's been working pretty hard. He did a ten mile run yesterday morning and the owner of the Bare Knuckle Hall of Fame arranged for a local lady to run with Jimmy on the old rail bed of the Erie. She's a nice gal, pretty too, who's training for a marathon. They're doing a four miler after Jimmy spars today. Jimmy split some wood as part of his training this morning. First time he's ever done that. I had to coach him a little but he got the hang of it pretty quickly and got a couple of blisters to show for his time.
The barns we're staying in are really cool. This was the spot John L. Sullivan trained for the last bare knuckle championship fight and Jimmy is the first guy to train here for over 100 years. No electricity in the barns, so it's early to bed and early to rise. It was raining this morning so I let Jimmy sleep in a little. We did get our walk in right after breakfast, however. I brought an old army style cot with me to sleep on - the thing is probably 40 years old. The canvas ripped this morning when I leaned over to shut the alarm off so I'll be sleeping on the work-out mat this evening. At least I didn't fall through the thing last night. I about froze the first night. It was pretty warm when I went up to bed and as the night cooled off I kept waking up cold, adding another layer off clothing and going back to sleep. I did that about three times before it was time to get up.
We had John L. Sullivan wings last night for dinner at the Belfast Hotel - real tasty. Pretty cool old place and the people here have just been wonderful to all of us. We had a press conference when we got in on Tuesday that was well attended by the local press. A couple of really nice articles in the paper and a radio spot to boot. Other than the rain last night and the little bit this morning, the weather has been great.
I'm typing this up at the local library and the hours are pretty spotty, especially with Jimmy's busy schedule. I'll try and get up another post in a couple of days.
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