Morrocan, Russian tops in marathon

Khalid Boumlili of Morocco and Yulia Gromova of Russia were the men’s and women’s winners of Sunday’s Rock ‘N’ Roll Marathon, run along 26.2 miles of San Diego roadways, which were lined with dozens of bands, thousands of cheerleaders and race fans.

Boumlili completed the course in 2:11:15, outpacing Samuel Mugo’s 2:12:36 and Tesfaye Tola’s 2:13:02 to lead the men’s division. Mugo is from Kenya and Tola is from Ethiopia.

Gromova won her second straight Rock ‘N’ Roll Marathon by blowing away the women’s field with a time of 2:27:36, nearly two minutes ahead of second- place finisher Hellen Kimutai of Kenya, who finished in 2:29:32, and Nuta Olaru of Romania, who came in third with a time of 2:30:40.

The event, now in its 12th year, began in Balboa Park, wound through Hillcrest and downtown San Diego, skirted Mission Bay and concluded at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot.

More than 40 live bands performed on stages set up at each mile along the race course, where there where also the cheerleaders, themed water stations and a post-race concert.

Hundreds of runners in Elvis outfits are also part of the tradition.

Along with all of the fun are road closings. Most closings started at 5

a.m. and streets were intermittently shut down and reopened as the straggler

make their way along the course.