PITTSBURGH — Pittsburgh knows death, whether it's the dead-as-a-doornail steel industry, horror movie maker George Romero's flesh-eating zombies or, until last year, the Pittsburgh Marathon.

But, unlike its extinguished blast furnaces and nights of the living dead, a new day has dawned for the Pittsburgh Marathon, resurrected last year after a five-year hiatus and boasting a record 16,000 runners for Sunday's event. Observers say the race is fast becoming a premier running attraction, fueled by a new sponsor — Dick's Sporting Goods — and a national distance-running craze partially driven by something Pittsburghers really understand: economic uncertainty.

"It's back from the dead," said Dave Monti, who publishes Race Results Weekly, an Internet service that provides runners with results from 3,000 races around the world each year. "The Wall Street Journal recently did a story about how marathon times were improving because of the recession. It was kind of tongue-in-cheek, but it's true."

"People who run tend to be very loyal to the sport and hold onto it through thick and thin: You've lost your job and you're not sure who you are anymore, but you're still a runner."

The Pittsburgh Marathon began in 1985 with about 2,500 participants and grew into an elite-level race, serving as the U.S. Olympic women's marathon trials in 1998. The race attracted 6,000 runners from all 50 states and 20 other countries in 2003, before sponsors balked when the cash-strapped city decided it could not afford police overtime and other costs of safeguarding a 26.2-mile course.

"Normally speaking, events that have elite fields and spend money on athletes, when they have a sponsor fall out and, even worse, have a city fall out the way Pittsburgh did, they normally just die," Monti said. "They don't come back."

This year, 5,000 people are registered to run the full marathon; 8,000 will run in the half marathon — a distance increasingly popular with women and more casual runners who don't have time to train for the full race — and 3,000 are on five-person relay teams.

This will be the second year Kevin Smith, 44, is running the half marathon, and he's thrilled with Dick's participation even though the big box retailer competes with his Elite Runners and Walkers store in nearby Robinson Township.

"Dick's is the big giant down the street from me. But without them, this would never have happened. It's good for them and good for me," said Smith, who estimates 60 percent of his customers have some connection to the race. If they're not running in it, they've started running because they have a friend who is, he said.

Smith estimates visitors and racers will pump $7 million to $10 million into the local economy, though that appears to be a low estimate. A marketing report by Forward Analytics determined last year's race generated $21.6 million in spending, including nearly $900,000 in state, city and county tax revenues.

The sporting goods retail chain, based in Findlay Township about 10 miles west of the city, stepped in as title sponsor to revive the race, which drew 10,000 runners last year.

Chief marketing officer Jeff Hennion said Dick's didn't step up sooner because it wasn't big enough. The company had about 100 stores when it went public in October 2002, about seven months before the city disbanded the race. Dick's now operates more than 400 stores in 40 states, and another 91 Golf Galaxy stores.

The chain also sponsors the Bolder Boulder 10K, which will attract about 50,000 runners in Colorado on May 30, to "bookend" its National Runners Month promotions.

Hennion said Dick's projected 30 percent growth for this year's Pittsburgh Marathon, but got 60 percent, a jump that could have been larger had organizers not capped registration to a safe, quality experience, said race director Patrice Matamoros.