James2Odsal

Hi,

This is a little humbling, putting this on the Rhinos site, but hey ho. Copied and pasted from RAB....

Good Morning everyone.

I think I've had an idea that could be huge, but I'll need a lot of help.

Just to introduce myself, my name is Andy and my Brother James and I have been Bulls season ticket holders for years. That doesn't sound special in itself except we travel from Newcastle to every game.

James has Downs Syndrome, and the Bulls are his love. In 2009 we completed 100 rounds of kickboxing on the Odsal field (my claim to fame is a Mr. Wayne Godwin broke my nose during it!!). During a long walk yesterday I had a eureka moment and ran it past James. We are going to walk from Whitley Bay to Odsal. It'll take a week and we need the Bulls on board. No-ones gonna talk us out of it, you can't stop a Bull when it's made up it's mind.

For those who think this next bit is ludicrous, please read the bit afterwards. This could raise the "other half million". All we need is 100,000 people thinking a lad with Downs Syndrome walking easily over 150 miles to try and save his beloved Rugby side is worthy of a fiver. Who wouldnt? Heaven's sake, people in his home town are doing just that, without a clue who the Bradford Bulls even are (Ive told them to hang on to thier fivers till we get this up and running). Our local landlord only knew they were a Rugby league outfit when he put the tele on so we could hear the somewhat "non-announcement".

Ive provisionally got Whitley Bay-Sunderland-'Boro-York-West Yorks (including Leeds and I AM being serious) as the route, ending at Odsal. We'll camp along the way. James is friends with a lot of Bulls players and I imagine they'd happily lend him some training gear for this.

Can we do it? It's why I told you about the 100 rounds. If youre still in doubt keying in James Lights Out Olsen to a well known file sharing site should get you footage of his honourary world title win (wKO3, v a 20 time world champ no less).

Hopefully I can get as many people behind this. The story of James's life is that with the right support, he is capable of achieving the impossible. If anyone sees a way they can help then Lord knows nows the time to come forward.

We walk for the Bulls, we're alright

There's a couple of things I'd like to add though. Rest assured the Rhinos equivilent of James (and such people exsist, James has played at a festival for people with Learning Difficulties at Headingley) doing this should your club ever be in difficulty would get way more than a fiver for this. We'll be going through Leeds City Centre (date not yet confirmed but almost deffo the end of the month). I hope you could show your support, not for the Bulls but for the RL community and one of its members James. Feel free to trade as much banter as you like but I'd like to think there's a donation at the end of it.

Thanks for reading,

Andy