L.A. Marathon Makes Strides for Harmony

They numbered more than 19,000 strong, and from the swiftest of the wheelchair racers to the very last of the stragglers, they formed a 26.2-mile pageant of human willpower Sunday as the eighth Los Angeles marathon offered signs of hope for a city warily nearing the anniversary of last spring’s riots.

With the help of Muhammad Ali, a team of Elvises, Spider-Man and one self-proclaimed “white-collar criminal” who ran in a business suit and handcuffs, the event that some people describe as the city’s biggest block party succeeded in showing that Los Angeles could remember how to smile.

Two women who had not met until they came to the starting line to watch their husbands run had this exchange:

“Hopefully something like this can bring L.A. back together,” said Christina Lee.

“It does for a day,” said Annie Lugar.

Although the 87-degree weather forced many exhausted runners to drop out early and kept times slow, organizers were touting it as perhaps the finest Los Angeles Marathon yet. Event President Bill Burke said the race drew the largest crowd of spectators, numbering hundreds of thousands along the circuitous route.

Heat kept paramedics busy, but no serious injuries were reported. Unlike last year’s marathon, which was marred when Los Angeles police shot and killed a man who had attacked an officer near the finish line, Sunday proved a thankfully slow day for the Los Angeles Police Department.

Joseildo Rocha of Brazil won the men’s race in 2 hours, 14 minutes, 29 seconds. Lubov Klochko of Ukraine won the women’s race in 2:39:49. Both won luxury automobiles.

Even if many of the participants were there simply to run a marathon and not to resolve society’s problems, Burke and others saw the results as a vindication of their resistance to suggestions that the race be rerouted away from neighborhoods hard-hit by the riots.

There were many winners, Mayor Tom Bradley said.

“It’s always an event that pulls the city together,” Bradley said at the starting line at Exposition Boulevard and Figueroa Street. “Some idiotic people wanted to change the race (route), but people know better. This is still a city of harmony.”

The high point of the marathon’s 9 a.m. start was the appearance of former heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali, whose presence has become a tradition.

His movements slowed by Parkinson’s disease, Ali was guided by security guards to a platform with Bradley and other dignitaries. As Randy Newman’s “I Love L.A.” blared from loudspeakers, Ali waved and pointed to spectators and the river of runners who, as in previous years, chanted his name as they ran past him toward the towers of downtown.

A few Marines who attended the start in their dress blues asked for an autograph from the nation’s most famous conscientious objector; Ali was stripped of his title for evading the draft during the Vietnam War.

The 26.2-mile course took runners north through downtown. Along the edge of Skid Row, homeless people gazed silently on the procession of runners, police and news media.

In Little Tokyo, Japanese drummers provided a pulsating rhythm over the soft slapping of running shoes on pavement. In Chinatown, runners were greeted by lion dancers, firecrackers and Miss Chinatown. Here, as elsewhere, vendors peddled balloons, souvenirs and food--its ethnic flavor changing neighborhood by neighborhood along the route.

As the fastest runners pulled away and the slow ones fell behind, the procession headed northwest on Sunset Boulevard, where Latin rock and salsa bands played along the sidewalks. And at Park Avenue and Sunset, three men from a group of five Elvises who ran the whole race in Vegas-style white bell-bottoms briefly joined a pop folk duo, The Eddisons, for an impromptu rendition of “Heartbreak Hotel.”

“That’s the only one we know. We faked it,” said Edie Eddison. Besides, even the Elvises did not know all the lyrics, she added.

Across Sunset, 15-year-old Sheree Harrell and other teen-age girls from Compton Community Seventh-day Adventist Church were cheering on friends in the race when one spotted “the old guy from ‘Martin,’ ” a Fox TV sitcom. It was actor Garrett Morris, known to older fans from “Saturday Night Live.”

Earlier, the 56-year-old Morris had made it clear that he would not set a record. “I’m so slow I’ve been passed up by pregnant women,” he said.

Turning left onto Hollywood Boulevard, runners passed such landmarks and tourist traps as the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Frederick’s of Hollywood, the Ripley’s Believe It or Not “Odditorium,” and Mann’s Chinese Theater, where runners were serenaded by heavy metal rock.

One young street person sitting at the marathon’s midpoint marveled at the spectacle: “I didn’t know there were that many healthy people.”

Even so, many runners were wilting in the heat. Airport shuttle vans were quickly filled with marathoners who, complaining of dehydration, cramps and blisters, were ferried back to the Coliseum. “I’m dehydrated. I’m dizzy,” said one runner. She declined to give her name, saying: “This isn’t my proudest moment.”

Runners turned south out of Hollywood and into tony Hancock Park, where some residents along Rossmore Avenue held marathon-watching parties on well-manicured lawns. One man offered runners a cooling shower with a garden hose, and young capitalists operated a lemonade stand.

Turning left on Wilshire Boulevard, runners thundered across the timbers that cover Metro Rail construction as they headed past the shuttered Ambassador Hotel. Another turn took them past a Guatemalan street festival that has also become an annual event.

Just as Ali was cheered at the start, Guatemalans cheered another retired champ who stood on the sidelines Sunday. They chanted “Mateo! Mateo! Mateo!” in honor of 72-year-old Mateo Flores, who became his nation’s greatest sports hero in 1952 when, running barefoot, he set a course record in the Boston Marathon.

“Viva Guatemala!” the crowds cheered as runners wearing their country’s colors hurried past. And when a familiar comic book hero jogged by, one man yelled: “Viva Spider-Man!”

In Koreatown, where runners passed burned-out storefronts, protesters used the occasion to hold up signs demanding reparation for riot damage. On Crenshaw Boulevard, more burned-out businesses and vacant lots served as a poignant backdrop for marathoners. Here the music was gospel and contemporary jazz.

At the 23-mile mark, runners turned down Rodeo Road and headed for the finish to cheers of spectators. The crowds grew dense along the homestretch and blasted hip-hop sounds from large stereo systems.

For those who finished the ordeal, the reward was a medal, a bottle of water, free snacks provided by sponsors--and medical attention.

Perhaps the most serious health emergency occurred in a concurrent five-kilometer race in which one man was found to have a life-threatening temperature of 107, said Dr. Sonny Cobble, marathon medical director. Doctors lowered his temperature.

Among the finishers were the Elvises, Orange County men who recorded a time of 5 hours, 26 minutes, but who claimed that they would have done better if they had not stopped to hand out scarves to “Priscillas” along the way.

They also stopped for a drink. “It’s just a party,” said one Elvis.

Others saw the event as a challenge. Peter Lassen, a 53-year-old Los Angeles architect, in his eighth year in the wheelchair division, started doing this on a bet.

“I was sitting in a bar with a buddy in a wheelchair and we bet each other that we could do it,” he said. The Vietnam veteran lost the use of his legs after a land mine explosion.

Lassen does not try to compete with the likes of this year’s wheelchair division winner, Jan Mattern of Arlington, Tex., who finished in 1:32:15.

“I’m not one of those guys with shoulders out to here,” Lassen said with a gesture.

“I just love doing it.”

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