Maturites meet for FLM 2003!

For all RW forumites...this is the story of how regulars of the Mature thread on the forum first met in person. Wee Piglet, Ironwolf, JJ and Helegant were running, I was supporting. We'd never clapped eyes on each other before, but we arranged to get together at the FLM expo on registration day. It was a wonderful occassion, and proves what a great bunch the Maturites are...

Many thanks to Wee Piglet for hosting this on her site. And hope all's well with you, Shirl.

Friday 11th April 2003

(Wee Piglet, Meerkat, Ironwolf, JJ, Helen Wheels)

1800 at the FLM expo, and Maturites converge on the Runner's World stand for a first historic meeting. Helen W pauses to talk to someone at RW and mentions she's a forumite. 'Oh,' says the RW staffer, 'you're all mad.' Tense moments pass but soon Wee Piglet, meerkat, Ironwolf, JJ and Helen W have all met and exchanged greetings. Ironwolf tells terrible tales of how all the dogs she knows are eating mattresses, furniture and whole rooms. Mr Ironwolf appears briefly but he is a man with a mission and soon heads off. WP, JJ, Helen W and meerkat decide to make a number of important site inspections before retiring for pasta.

Onwards and Stickwards

(JJ, Wee Piglet, Helen Wheels)

In honour of Piglet's stick, we make a visit to the Stick Stand. Helen W had popped in earlier, and had sized up one of the assistants, Patrick: 'Patrick was massaging my neck (yum) with his stick, and I was blissing out and reading the names of famous runners on the wall. I noticed Piglet wasn't there. So told him he was missing the name of one of the most vocal proponents of the Stick. He looked blank so I explained that Wee Piglet is a very good and well known runner who not only uses the stick but tells everyone else how wonderful it is. I promised to bring Wee Piglet along to introduce her personally later on.' At some point in the conversation, Helen realised that Patrick was struggling with the meaning of all this. It turned out that he was Austrian, so Helen explained what 'Wee' and 'Piglet' meant. Patrick seemed grateful but confused.

JJ confused the poor chap even further by complaining that his legs had felt fine until he'd used the stick on them.

Piglet goes Upside Down


Next up was the Hanging Upside Down stand, where Piglet leapt forward to try out the inversion devices. All went well until her jumper began to obey the laws of gravity. But she rallied wonderfully, and hung upside down happily for several minutes. I was interested in the device that clipped over a door and employed boots for inverting oneself, but JJ reckoned these had a sinister purpose. Helen pointed out that this was not something to try at home alone.

We Salute JimC!

(Wee Piglet, JJ, Helen Wheels)

Last stop was the Marine Corps marathon stand, and a salute to Jim C. Run strong Jim! The spirit of the Maturites will be with you!

Then we hiked back into town and followed JJ to a fine pasta place. Much guzzling of important carbs followed. At last JJ, WP and Helen head off to their hotels to rest up for the big day.

For the story of what happened on race day,
read on...