Kenyan Runs Record Race in L.A. Marathon

From the moment Simon Bor pulled away from a longtime friend who was now his biggest threat, his victory in Sunday’s running of the Los Angeles Marathon was never in doubt.

But even as the lithe 30-year-old Kenyan left the pack behind, the event’s drama kept building because this was no ordinary marathon. Organizers said they would redesign the scenic yet torturously hilly 26.2-mile course if the winner failed to finish in less than two hours and 10 minutes, the benchmark of a fast marathon.

Bor saved the course, running like a 400-meter sprinter near the end, with his knees high and his fast-moving feet springing toward his backside. Bor’s time, 2:09:24, broke the 11-year-old course record by 55 seconds.

The new record spared marathon President Bill Burke the agony of mapping a new course, and he was obviously relieved.

“God took that decision out of my hands today, and I want to thank him for that,” Burke said in a television interview.

Irina Bogacheva was the first woman to cross the finish line with a time of 2 hours, 30 minutes and 32 seconds.

The victors--who led an unprecedented 20,600 runners--each won more than a title. Bor received $60,000 for winning the race and another $25,000 for his record-setting time. Bogacheva won $40,000 with a $5,000 bonus. Each also received a Honda Accord.

Both winners left sick competitors in their wakes. At the 18-mile mark, Bor charged away from Christopher Chebolboch, his friend, countryman and training partner, as Chebolboch clutched his cramping stomach, finishing third.

Bogacheva, of Russia, was alone at the end of the women’s race in part because two-time winner Lornah Kiplagat of Kenya dropped out early.

Kiplagat collapsed, crouching on a curb near Koreatown, unable to finish. She recovered quickly and was whisked away by an ambulance before the marathon’s sea of runners began to move through downtown in waves.

The race began at Figueroa and 6th streets downtown and headed through Jefferson Park, Country Club Park, Koreatown, Hancock Park, Hollywood, Silver Lake, Westlake and Pico-Union before finishing up downtown in front of the Los Angeles Central Library.

The 14th annual marathon was dedicated to the late Tom Bradley, who helped launch the event during his record 20 years in office.

Also honored posthumously were Olympic gold medalist Florence Griffith-Joyner, who grew up in Watts, and Los Angeles Times Pulitzer Prize-winning sports columnist Jim Murray.

The gravity of those memorials soon gave way to the festive mood of the participants. They came in all shapes and sizes, and they ranged from the absolutely determined to the absolutely weird.

One Elvis Presley impersonator pushed a stroller. Runners dressed as Superman, Batman and Robin. And one guy even wore a canary yellow suit to look like, well, a canary.

Blythe Peelor of Venice and Sydney Butz of Brooklyn, N.Y., were at West 3rd Street downtown to greet all of them. The pair handed out oranges, bananas and hard candy to runners while their daughters rested nearby in strollers.

“We felt it was our duty to come here,” said Peelor, who, like Butz, has run the New York City marathon. “We know what it’s like to have people on the sidelines cheering--it really helps.”

Nearby on Highland Avenue, Claudia Roberts watched from a grassy median and pointed out the runners’ nationalities to her 4-year-old son, Avi. “There’s so many people here from all over the world,” she said.

“It’s very emotional. When I see them, I get very choked up,” said Roberts, who lives on Highland. “It’s more than running and winning. There’s more to it. It’s man’s triumph over his limitations.”

Jim Cregan, who lives on McCadden Place near West 3rd Street, brought his children out when he saw on television that the wheelchair competitors were approaching.

“For these guys--it must be a lot of pain and incredible stamina and endurance to do this,” he said. “It’s very inspirational.”

Twenty-six youngsters used the race as a memorial tribute. The members of Our House, a Westwood charity for children who have lost a parent, each ran a mile of the marathon in their memory, said volunteer Hilary Cohen. “It makes them proud of themselves for doing something for the parent who died,” she said.

The children ran right past members of the Front Runners, who dressed like marathoners but did not get out on the grueling race course themselves.

“We’re faking it,” said Barry Norcross, a member of Front Runners, a gay and lesbian runners’ club. Norcross used to run marathons, but admits he “only” runs 25 miles a week now. “I miss knowing I was going to run.”

At 9 a.m., the wheelchairs zoomed by on their way to the most thrilling finish of this year’s marathon. The first three competitors were so close that any of them could have been a winner, and each could use a good prayer.

“Good morning! And welcome to the corner of Wilshire and Normandie!” the Rev. Donald Colhour bellowed into a microphone over the sound of early morning salsa music. “We’re here to cheer everyone on, and to praise God!”

Minutes later, Saul Mendoza of Mexico won the wheelchair race for the third year in a row, his powerful arms propelling him to a razor’s-edge margin over two competitors.

On the final stretch of the runners’ marathon, near Mile 25, the cheering was deafening.

There were loud-pounding Aztec drums, rattles and the sounding of a conch as the Cuauhtemoc dance group performed along Wilshire Boulevard, just a block away from MacArthur Park in the Westlake area where Bor made his dramatic turn home.

The mostly Latino crowd occasionally broke into Spanish-language cheers: “Vamos, vamos” (“Go, go”), or “Si se puede” (“Yes, you can do it.”).

As a Guatemalan runner entered the stretch, a boy with a Guatemalan flag came up next to him and began running alongside him as spectators cheered.

“Guatemala! That’s my country,” yelled Olga Martinez, 46, who lives in the Westlake area, as she jumped into the street and screamed for the runner to “go, go, go!”

But Martinez, who has attended the marathon for the last four years, had equal enthusiasm for all the runners and wheelchair participants who passed her. “I love it--the emotion, the excitement, because all people, all nationalities are here,” she said.

Myra Espinoza, 9, of Echo Park, also tried to help the marathoners along in her own way. “You go, girl!” she yelled to female runners. “You’re the bomb!”

An aspiring marathon runner herself, Espinoza said cheering for the racers makes her feel “happy, hyper.”

“I feel good doing this because I think I give them more energy,” she said. As she screamed another “you go girl!” a runner flashed an acknowledging grin.

“You see?” Espinoza said. “They laugh.”

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Contributing to this report were Times staff writers Agnes Diggs and Hannah Miller.