On race day in the mid-1980's, Allan Steinfeld received an alarming telephone call 50 minutes before the New York City Marathon was to begin. The police had made an arrest along the course in Queens after drugs were found in 55-gallon drums, and law enforcement officials had blocked the road to anyone in a car or on foot.
Steinfeld, then the assistant race director, relayed this message: In less than two hours, 23,000 runners would be descending upon Queens. The law enforcement officials could either move or be trampled. They moved.
If a note of melancholy attends the 25th running of today's New York City Marathon, with the recent death from brain cancer of its spiritual leader, Fred Lebow, there is also an uplifting sense that the race has generated its own inexorable momentum. That it rests in capable hands with the technical skills of Steinfeld. And that not even a police roadblock can alter its path.
"I don't think the race is going to lose a step," said Charles McCabe, the executive vice president of Chemical Bank, the marathon's chief corporate sponsor. "When Roosevelt died, people thought the country would collapse, but Truman came along and developed his own personality. With Allan, the marathon will have a new personality. Not Fred's, but the race is really bigger than one man."
Twenty-four former champions have returned to commemorate the quarter century that has made New York into the world's most popular marathon. Lebow's absence has brought a certain wistfulness, but his presence will be felt in a series of celebratory tributes.
Planes will stream red, white and blue smoke at the start. Six times along the course, skywriters will print the message, "For you, Fred." At the finish line, a life-size statue of Lebow in his trademark running suit and hat, glancing at his watch, will greet those among the 29,000 entrants who complete the 26.2-mile course.
Lebow's most evident legacy will be simply the size and revelry of the New York Marathon. Unlike the Boston Marathon, which remains foremost an athletic contest, New York has developed into a festive celebration of health and fitness among serious but largely unprofessional runners.
Still, at the time of its 25th running, the race finds itself in natural transition without Lebow, without a live network television contract and without a stable of marathoners provided by the running program of John Hancock Financial Services, which has supplied elite racers to New York since 1988.
"In my view, it will continue to be the only event that can stop New York for a few hours," said Dave D'Alessandro, the senior executive vice president of John Hancock Financial Services, who is given credit for reviving the Boston Marathon. "But it's allure as a world-class, elite-athlete event has been diminishing for some time."
He added: "It's the grande dame of running events. But the world-class marathoners don't say, 'I have to run New York; that's the one I have to win.' They say that about Boston. The New York Marathon has turned into a great spectacle for people living in New York. It has turned into a giant New York party, a healthy event, an event for the fit."
This year's race does not include last year's champions -- Andres Espinosa of Mexico and Uta Pippig of Germany -- but the real possibility exists that, for the first time in more than a decade, one or both of the winners will be American citizens. An American victor would be awarded a $100,000 prize bonus.
Arturo Barrios and Olga Appell, both natives of Mexico, have recently gained their American citizenship after disputes with the Mexican track and field federation. Barrios, who lives in Boulder, Colo., finished third last year in the men's race in two hours 12 minutes 21 seconds. Appell, who lives in Albuquerque, N.M., finished second to Pippig in 1993 with a time of 2:28:56.
The last American man to win the race was Alberto Salazar, a three-time champion in 1980, 1981 and 1982. The last American woman to win in New York was Miki Gorman in 1976 and 1977.
"I'm not afraid to take the lead halfway and to say, 'If you're going to beat me, you're going to have to pass me,' " said Barrios, who posted his career best of 2:08:28 at the 1994 Boston Marathon.
Barrios will be challenged by Vincent Rousseau of Belgium, who posted the world's third-fastest time this year, 2:07:51, in winning the Rotterdam Marathon, and by German Silva of Mexico, who trains by running up the side of a volcano outside Mexico City. The former champions Willie Mtolo (1992) of South Africa, Salvador Garcia (1991) of Mexico and Steve Jones (1988), the former world-record holder from Great Britain, are also capable of repeating as winners.
A problem for Rousseau may be the heat. The forecast is for temperatures in the high 60's or low 70's with thickening clouds, which may favor Mexican runners over European runners.
"The hotter the better," Appell said.
She is the favorite in a deep women's field that includes Nadia Prasad of France, last year's third-place finisher, Alena Peterkova of the Czech Republic, Albertina Dias of Portugal, Adriana Barbu and Anuta Catuna of Romania and Tecla Loroupe of Kenya, as well as Americans Kim Jones, twice a second-place finisher, and Anne Marie Letko, who dropped out of her first marathon in New York last year after becoming dehydrated.
"I'm back," said Letko, who is from Glen Gardner, N.J. "If I run my race the first 20 miles, when the real race begins, I'll be there."
