Marathon Marks Decade of Laurels--and a Few Blisters : Sports: L.A. race is hailed as a world-class, unifying event. But ethics probe and political fights mar its success.

The Los Angeles Marathon turns 10 years old Sunday, bigger and richer than ever but also carrying the scars of scandal and political battles that continue to plague what many now consider a world-class event.

The marathon was born in the afterglow of the 1984 Olympics and was an instant success, drawing even to its first running an international field of competitors and enough amateur runners to immediately make it one of the three largest events of its kind in the nation.

Long before civic leaders began talking about uniting the city in the aftermath of the 1992 riots, the marathon linked a diverse set of neighborhoods--for at least one day--in an event watched by the world.

The marathon is now solidly positioned as one of the major stops on the international marathon tour and is a key pre-Olympics testing ground. Organizers have grand plans that could double the size of the event by the year 2000 and incorporate still more sports into its eclectic lineup of affiliated events. They are now looking into tie-ins with Walt Disney Co. and considering branching out into auto racing and roller-blading.

Because of this kind of marketing, some professional runners have derisively called the Los Angeles Marathon a 26-mile block party. But it is a label accepted with great pride by race organizers, who say it is the only way to host a race in Tinseltown.

“We knew we couldn’t make it in L.A. if we were only a race,” said Los Angeles Marathon President Bill Burke. So race day is loaded with events aimed at including just about every segment of the city, and begins this year with a unique non-competitive bike tour of the race circuit that is expected to attract as many as 15,000 riders and be led by Mayor Richard Riordan.

But as it grows, the organization that runs the marathon is also beset by challenges, including the expiration of key sponsorships, a sometimes rocky relationship with City Hall and questions about political skulduggery and campaign fund laundering.

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Still, come Sunday, hundreds of thousands--runners and spectators alike--will pour into the streets from Hollywood to Crenshaw and from Hancock Park to Chinatown to enjoy one of the annual rites that makes this city a community.

“It brings Los Angeles together like nothing short of an earthquake,” said Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky.

“It helps us to know our city a little better, to make it feel not so big and spread out anymore,” said Linda Griego, president of RLA (formerly Rebuild L.A.).

And, noted Mike Collins of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, the marathon typically sends television pictures of sunny skies, sweating runners and lilting palm trees to a nation still largely mired in cold, gray March weather.

“It’s as natural an extension of the Southern California lifestyle as you can have,” Collins said.

Even without the civic spin, the numbers alone are impressive: 19,000 marathon runners, 4,000 more in a related 15-kilometer event and the 15,000 bicyclists. Added to that are 15,000 volunteer workers and more than 1 million spectators along the route.

An estimated 2.5 million local viewers will see some of the event live on television and 22 million more are expected to watch a national broadcast. The race will be televised in 133 countries, and runners in the event are representing 48 states and 31 countries.

By any one of these measures, the Los Angeles Marathon ranks among the top two or three in the nation, and top three or four in the world.

But it wasn’t always that way.

In the early stages, few in the city government or in the running community gave the event much hope of success.

Six previous attempts by various promoters to establish a Los Angeles Marathon all failed. So when a new proposal surfaced in the feel-good days after the successful 1984 Olympics, some began digging a seventh grave.

“At first, we were skeptical,” said Amby Burfoot, executive editor of Runner’s World magazine. “We thought it would be more of a media event than a running event. . . . We thought, ‘Who are these people?’ ”

But the continued success of the Los Angeles Marathon has silenced the many skeptics and turned some into participants as well as believers.

Yaroslavsky, then a City Councilman, voted against awarding the franchise to the current organizers. “I didn’t think they could do it,” he said.

Since then, Yaroslavsky has run the marathon once and ridden in a pace car several times. “I was wrong,” said a reformed Yaroslavsky. “They’ve done an outstanding job.”

The running community agrees.

“Now at 10 years, it’s a good time to give credit for all that they have accomplished,” Burfoot said. “You have to give them credit for hanging in and growing in stature.”

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The marathon was the brainchild of Burke--a former City Council aide, health care entrepreneur and tennis commissioner of the 1984 Olympics, who was not a runner and had never been involved in a marathon.

“After the Olympics, I was like all the other volunteers: I didn’t want it to be over,” Burke said. So he and a few friends put together a list of 35 events that they could propose, and out of that exercise grew the marathon proposal.

Burke’s team came in third in the city’s ranking of groups bidding on a marathon franchise. But politically savvy and connected, Burke, who is married to County Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, won the contract anyway.

With the Los Angeles Olympics as a guide, a little luck and lots of natural promotional talent, Burke quickly pulled in Mercedes-Benz as a primary sponsor and KCOP television as a media outlet.

Then, when they were expecting about 5,000 runners for their first event, organizers were stunned to get more than 10,000 entries.

The marathon was off and running.

It’s a distinctly Hollywood-style road race in which runners this year will be treated to 10 pianists on 10 grand pianos as a way to celebrate the 10th anniversary. And among the runners is the 22-woman Playboy racing team.

“You don’t find that in Chicago or Boston,” Burke said. “This is Hollywood.”

Indeed, race organizers have miraculously turned what was arguably an obscure race for a small cult of physical-fitness masochists into a “happening.”

At 10 “entertainment centers” along the route, spectators and runners will find Japanese classical dancers, mariachi bands, Chinese lion dancers, rock ‘n’ roll bands in front of the historic Mann’s Chinese Theatre, marimba music, Guatemalan singers, gospel choirs, reggae bands, comedians and Native American dancers.

The marathon also sponsors an expo at the Convention Center that draws 100,000 people and more than 300 exhibitors.

Weather could be a big factor in this year’s race. WeatherData, which provides forecasts for The Times, is predicting an 80% chance of rain on Sunday, which could be welcomed by runners, who generally prefer cool, damp weather, but could keep hundreds of thousands of spectators at home.

As the marathon has grown, so has its financial clout.

The Los Angeles Marathon was known in its early years for having a sparser field of elite runners than other major marathons, which could afford to pay large sums in attendance fees and prize money. In fact, in 1986, organizers declared it the “people’s race” because there was no money to pay elite runners.

More recently, the marathon has attracted world champions. And this year, with more than $500,000 in fees and prizes available, the marathon has attracted its strongest field ever and will include all of the runners who are expected to make next year’s U.S. Olympic team, according to the editors of Runner’s World and Running Times magazines, who rank the Los Angeles Marathon as a world-class event.

Now that they have made it to the 10-year mark, organizers are laying out an even more ambitious agenda to take the event through the year 2000, when the current city contract expires.

Among the plans are a potential marketing arrangement with Disney that could bring an additional 15,000 runners from around the country. Burke is also exploring a network television deal and is considering expanding into auto racing and roller-blading events.

L.A. Marathon Inc. is also weighing invitations to create a marathon in Las Vegas and a concert series in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, Burke said.

But Burke and the marathon have also had setbacks over the years, and they continue to face challenges.

Though still generally popular with the City Council, Burke has had repeated fights with the city bureaucracy over the contract.

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Early on, Burke fought efforts by city officials to audit his books and to make sure the city was getting its fair share of the race revenue. Unlike most major marathons, such as those in New York and Boston, which are organized by nonprofit corporations, Los Angeles’ marathon is operated by a for-profit concern, owned largely by Burke.

Burke eventually got the contract rewritten, limiting the city’s ability to audit the books.

City officials have also complained that the marathon has been late in paying its bills, sometimes more than a year overdue. But over the years, Burke has been able to repeatedly persuade the city to waive many fees and to absorb some of the race costs.

In 1989, there was a flap when the marathon sought to pay its debt to the city through an unusual arrangement in which it would provide free advertising to city agencies, such as the zoo, in lieu of cash payments. City officials later reported that most of the advertising was never used and was not free.

Burke has maintained that the city has received all it was due and more.

Furthermore, Burke says he makes no money from the marathon, calling it a “gift to the city.” All of the millions of dollars raised in entry fees, sponsorships and television rights is spent on operations, he says.

These skirmishes paled in comparison to an ethics investigation that concluded last fall that marathon employees illegally laundered more than $50,000 in campaign contributions to 14 City Council members and other politicians around the state.

Burke did not concede any personal responsibility, but the marathon organization agreed to pay more than $200,000 in fines to the city Ethics Commission and an additional $236,000 to the state Fair Political Practices Commission.

Three of the five members of the city Ethics Commission said they strongly suspected Burke knew of the scheme, but they were unable to make a case after one of his subordinates accepted full blame.

Burke maintains that he had nothing to do with the affair.

Three months after the ethics settlements were announced, the City Council, after contentious debate, voted 9 to 5 to waive nearly $200,000 in city fees owed by the marathon.

“The city is not being reimbursed for its expenses and (marathon) management has been found guilty of money laundering,” Councilman Joel Wachs said. “But I’m more angry than anything at the City Council for giving them back $200,000--that just happens to match the fine. It’s sanctioning the laundering.”

Burke said the ethics incident has had repercussions on the race.

Some elite runners, he said, worried that the marathon would not have enough money to pay their attendance fees and questioned whether they should sign on with another marathon. Burke persuaded them not to change plans.

Burke said it also affected his ability to deal with potential sponsors.

The marathon’s largest and longest-standing sponsor, Mercedes-Benz, is dropping its sponsorship after its contract runs out Sunday.

Burke said he has another automobile manufacturer already signed up to take Mercedes’ place, but acknowledged that it is a constant battle to find and retain sponsors.

“I work on it 365 days a year,” he said.

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As the marathon works through its challenges, it is helping the city through its own tough times.

“The marathon restored our faith in what we can do after the civil unrest,” said Councilman Nate Holden, who has run the marathon twice. “It pulls the city together after riots, after earthquakes.”

Said David Friedman, an attorney and commentator on urban issues: “The marathon is one of the few things that unambiguously works and works well. It’s a public affirmation that a large number of people can get together, have fun and do it safely. . . . L.A. is in a search for that kind of imagery.”

When asked what the race means to him, Burke at first demurred, but then quoted from a presentation he once made to a dying woman whose last wish was to complete the marathon: “Running narrows the distance between what we are and what we can be . . . between the actual self and the idea . . . between reality and aspiration.”

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Race Route Closures

The Los Angeles Marathon, which starts at 8:40 a.m. Sunday, will force many street closures in central Los Angeles.

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Off-Ramp Closures

Ramps will reopen after race participants have passed.

1) 37th/Exposition at Harbor Fwy.: 6:15 a.m.

2) 6th St. at Harbor Fwy.: 6 a.m.

3) Spring St. at Hollywood Fwy.: 6 a.m.

4) Hollywood Blvd. at Hollywood Fwy.: 6:15 a.m.

5) Vine/Gower St. at Hollywood Fwy.: 6:15 a.m.

6) Crenshaw at Santa Monica Fwy.: 6:30 a.m.