Sunday's championship football game offered a classic battle of youth versus experience, of trash-talking upstarts versus old-school veterans accustomed to victory.

"Old age, that's their weakness," said David Thomas, 30, a star defender for the rising Raleigh Thunder. "Write that down, old age."

Ken Harris, the 42-year-old center for the N.C. All-Stars, smiled calmly and said, "If we take care of business, we'll be all right."

When the final whistle blew at Lions Park in Raleigh, the All-Stars had backed up their quiet confidence with a 20-0 win in the Triangle Area Flag Football League's Preseason Invitational Tournament.

There were no pads or helmets, no million-dollar commercials and no gold rings for the winners.

There was $2,000 in cash and prizes for the All-Stars.

"But really, we're out here for pride, for bragging rights and just to prove that we can still do it," said Tim Kilpatrick, the All-Stars' 38-year-old quarterback.

Flag football's popularity has grown steadily in the Triangle since the first league was founded in 1987.

Today, there are at least three local leagues that serve about 2,000 players, said Tim Langdon, director of the N.C. Flag Football Association. "That's not counting all the intramural leagues at the colleges," he said.

Though the game schedules were initially confined to the fall, growing demand prompted the formation of spring schedules.

Although Langdon noted that the sport is "still a lot more popular north of the Mason-Dixon line," Raleigh squads have enjoyed tremendous success. At least three area teams have won national championships at the major tournament in Orlando since 1997, he said.

Teams -- often made up of friends who know each other from work or school -- can have as few as four and as many as nine players on the field at one time. The Raleigh tournament featured mostly 12-man squads (six on offense, six on defense) competing on a field 64 yards by 33 yards.

This made for a fast-paced, passing-oriented game.

The rosters included many former college players -- some of them from UNC-Chapel Hill, N.C. State University or N.C. Central University -- and a few veterans from the professional Arena League. But the competitors were not hulking Goliaths. In flag football, speed is king. Strong, wiry players who know how to play the angle on the small fields excel.

There is, of course, a fair measure of blissful punishment.

In its wildest form, the game is a full-contact tackle sport played without the array of pads worn by college and NFL warriors.

More often, as in Raleigh this weekend, the game resembles touch football. Instead of hurling each other to the ground -- though that did happen with painful regularity -- defenders try to strip one of two vinyl flags hanging from the ball carrier's waist.

So why do they offer up their aging bodies to this field of battle?

"You can work out all you want in the gym, but only competition can make you go past what you think you can do," said Jonathan McDougald, 32, a computer programmer who plays for the Raleigh Thunder.

"Late in a game, that pride factor kicks in and you can surprise yourself by what you and your teammates are capable of."

"You get a chance to be extraordinary out here where your everyday life can be just ordinary," said Bobby Haynes, 24, a student at Wake Tech who plays for the Titans. "And nothing matches that high you get when you make, or see, a really big hit."

Donnell Hall, 29, a professional mentor who has won two national titles -- in 2005 and 2007 -- as a member of the RDU Assault, summed it up best.

"I just love the game," he said.