Sue Willman

​About Sue

 

I was born in Devonshire, England (patchwork green fields, thatched cottages, clotted cream, not a lot of gay life). I blame my lesbian feminist socialist leanings on the Catholic girls’ school I went to. After graduating from Oxford, I came out and moved up north to agitate and organize – against Margaret Thatcher’s anti-gay clause 28, in anti-deportation campaigns, and in support of the miner’s strike. Eventually I ended up in London, lived in a lesbian co-operative and worked as a community lawyer. After about 15 years of nightclubbing, I gave in and took up running. My first run around Hyde Park with London Frontrunners was in January 1995 on a frosty morning. I managed to get there most Saturday mornings for a few years until the attractions of lying in bed and my long term partner, Pip, proved too much. A couple of years ago I broke my leg falling off a Scottish mountain. Somehow the break from running led me to apply for a Fulbright scholarship and move to the U.S. to study international human rights law. So I am extremely grateful to American tax payers for giving me a year off work.

 

 

​Questions

 

You said some very moving and heartfelt words during the announcements at last Saturday’s run. Can you say a bit about where that emotion came from? Living apart from my partner of 15 years was tough and the Front Runners was my alternative family/support network.

 

As someone who traversed the pond for a year and immersed yourself deeply in the Front Runners, what is your overall take on the club today, as you head home to England? I found the group to be a great combination of social running and walking and competitiveness.

 

How did you first come across us? I was the first female co-president of the London Frontrunners. When we set up, we had one woman and one man president to copy the San Francisco model and to try to encourage women to join. I’m not sure if my being President encouraged any women to join, but we are talking 16 years ago! So when I planned to come to Washington, I looked up the DC Front Runners online beforehand.

 

Being a ‘foreigner’ here, how did you find that club members treated you? Absolutely equally - except for the time someone asked if I was an Aussie.

 

Have you one especially fond memory from your time you can share?  The Ragnar Relay from Cumberland, Maryland to Washington DC, last fall. It was 193 miles, with four men - Cletus, Kenny, Kurt and Peter, and two women – Maura and Claudia. We were 36 hours in a van, it was 100 degrees Fahrenheit and I was driving, after not having driven on the right side of the road for a decade. Surprisingly, we had a fabulous time.

 

What is you favorite day to run with Front Runners and why? Saturday: for the bagels of course.

 

Is there any aspect of the club where you feel there is room for improvement? It’s tough being one of three or two or one women runners, especially at social events. I know most of the guys don’t come to Front Runners to meet women but it really makes a difference to us lonely females when you make an effort to chat to or run with us.

 

You’ve also run with London Frontrunners. How does the vibe here with the DC contingent differ from the Londoners? In London we shower together afterwards…and the breakfasts are greasier.

 

A cyclist offshoot of DCFRs seems to have sprung up since your arrival that you’ve been part of. Tell us a bit about that. I would like to say a big thank-you to Cletus Durkin for organizing these bike rides, for putting up with the moaning and the missing cyclists (Fritz, Rob, Jacques…) and for acting as a tour guide to DC’s most scenic corners, especially Great Falls.

 

And your year at Georgetown University. What did you learn there and what was it like studying in one of the country’s most prestigious institutions? Hopefully I learned how to sue multinational corporations who commit human rights and environmental abuses in developing countries, which is what I plan to do on my return to London. I also learned to Facebook.

 

Who is the Front Runner that you find most inspiring and why? It’s a tie for generosity between Cletus for all the drag costumes, Danny Waggoner for all the cupcakes, and Jane who cooked me a lot of dinners.

 

What is your motto in life?  This year it was ‘feel the fear and do it anyway.’ I was trying to be more American and less British - i.e. less pessimistic and cynical.

 

 

Interview by Brian Beary, Design by Marcel Acosta

May 2011