Los Angeles Marathon

When I stood on the starting line of the Los Angeles Marathon this spring, my main objective was to beat my husband. This was to be John's first marathon and my 10th. After years of track and cross-country, where I learned to jab with my elbows and spit neatly between my front teeth, I'd discovered that I'd grown from an upstart kid who kicked out short races into an adult athlete who valued serious training. Still, the marathon was my race; I didn't want to be dethroned by my husband.

Running a marathon is usually considered solid proof of cardiovascular fitness. Not so for Jay Yim, a runner in the recent Los Angeles Marathon. Yim, 21, suffered a heart attack around mile 18 and was taken to the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. He's expected to make a full recovery. Here's what happened: After Yim collapsed in West L.A., LAPD motorcycle officer Joshua Sewell was one of the first people to come to Yim's aid. When he got no response and found no pulse, Sewell yelled for someone to call an ambulance and recruited an LAPD bicycle officer to help administer CPR. Together, they performed chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

Wesley Korir loved it when a spectator shouted his name in Beverly Hills. He got a kick out of running through the historic Veterans Administration grounds in West Los Angeles. Of course, none of the sights or sounds of the revamped Los Angeles Marathon could rival what the Kenyan experienced at the finish line in Santa Monica. Korir received a hug and a kiss from his new wife after defending his title in the event Sunday morning, winning in 2 hours 9 minutes 19 seconds to become the first repeat champion here since Stephen Ndungu in 2001 and 2002.

One hundred and eleven runners were treated for medical maladies. Thirty were taken to hospitals. One went into full cardiac arrest. This qualified as "a very good day" for the Los Angeles Marathon. Given the record field of 26,054 on Sunday, Greg Gibson, an L.A. Fire Department battalion chief, said he expected 40 or more runners to require hospital visits. "The transports were down, which was great," Gibson, who has overseen medical treatment for most of the last 10 L.A. Marathons, said Monday.

When an estimated 25,000 runners hit the pavement early Sunday in the 25th Los Angeles Marathon, they will pass many of L.A.'s signature landscapes in a new "Stadium to the Sea" route. Beginning at Dodger Stadium, runners will wind their way through downtown, pass through West Hollywood, Beverly Hills and Santa Monica and end at the Pacific Ocean. Along the 26.2-mile course, runners will pass such landmarks as City Hall, the Capitol Records Tower, the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sunset Strip, Rodeo Drive and the Santa Monica Pier.

It starts in the Dodger Stadium parking lot, heads downtown and then winds through West Hollywood and Beverly Hills before finishing as the Los Angeles Marathon of Santa Monica. For the first time in its 25-year history, the L.A. Marathon isn't an entirely L.A. story, running outside the confines of the city limits on a stadium-to-the-sea course. Race organizers hope that a new route that will take runners past landmarks such as Grauman's Chinese Theatre, the Sunset Strip and Rodeo Drive on Sunday morning can transform what has been widely considered a second-tier event into something rivaling the New York and Boston marathons.

The Rev. Mary E. Haddad found it bizarre one recent Sunday to be telling the congregation at All Saints' Church in Beverly Hills to not bother showing up the morning of March 21. "Remember the Sabbath and keep it aerobic," the interim rector said. Officials of the Episcopal church had decided to cancel all four morning services on the day of the Los Angeles Marathon and hold one 6 p.m. service instead. "In 18 years of professional church work, I've never known anything to close church on a Sunday morning," Haddad said, adding that the decision speaks to L.A.'s automobile culture.

Wesley Korir won last year's Los Angeles Marathon and dozens cared. Marathons are noticed in Olympic years, or if they are held in your neighborhood and your driveway is blocked. In our self-indulgent, Web-hit-driven, celebrity-is-king approach to what is important in sports these days, you are Kobe, Manny, LeBron, Tiger or nobody. Korir is none of the above and far from nobody. He is a 27-year-old Kenyan with an amazing story. He comes from poverty, which is not unusual in sports.

The Los Angeles Marathon, preparing for its new Stadium to the Sea course and a sellout field of 25,000 entrants, announced Tuesday that it had landed a three-year title sponsorship deal with Honda. Marathon and Honda officials declined to reveal financial terms. The auto giant negotiated a multifaceted deal "for millions of dollars," according to marathon President Russ Pillar, to create the Honda Los Angeles Marathon -- the first title sponsor in the marathon's 25-year history -- and boost the event's ambition to stamp itself "as a destination race for international participants," Pillar said.

Frank McCourt had the breakfast crowd eating out of his hand. The Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce honored him Thursday for extending the Los Angeles Marathon to the Santa Monica Pier, and the Dodgers' owner stood up to say thank you. "It's been a very quiet off-season for me," McCourt said, as the room erupted in laughter. McCourt emerged from his self-imposed silence last week, granting his first interviews since his acrimonious divorce proceedings started three months ago, just as baseball's winter shopping season got underway.