The annual New York City marathon, which drew more than 50, 000 runners Sunday, was the largest ever in the history of the annual event since its inception in 1970.

The existing record of 46,795 runners in 2011 was outranked this year with 50,266 participants (30,699 men and 19,567 women) crossing the Central Park finishing line.

But as expected, the marathon was dominated by the world’s developing nations, largely from Africa, which grabbed most of the first 10 places as overall winners amongst men.

The winner was Geoffrey Mutai of Kenya with a timing of 2:08:24 followed by Tsegaye Kebede of Ethiopia with 2:09:16 and Lusapho April of South Africa with 2:09:45.

The other top 10 runners came from Kenya (fourth, fifth, eighth and ninth places), Japan, Uganda and Italy.

Amongst women, the winner, also from Kenya, was Priscah Jeptoo, with a timing of 2:25:07 followed by Buzunesh Deba representing the U.S., with 2:25:56 and Jelena Prokopcuka of Latvia, with a timing of 2:27:47.

The others in the top 10 came from France, Italy, the United States (sixth, eighth and tenth places), Germany and Kenya.

The course covered 26.2 miles snaking through all five boroughs in the city.

The two winners in the men’s and women’s events received $100,000 each in the race sponsored by ING, New York.

Additionally, Jeptoo won the World Marathon Majors title, along with $500,000 in prize money.

Described as one of the biggest spectator events in New York city, the marathon was cancelled last year due to Hurricane Sandy which caused devastation in parts of the city, including Staten Island, where the annual race originates on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, named after an Italian explorer from Florence.