Kenya's Evans Cheruiyot won the Chicago marathon title in a tightly contested race in USA on Sunday.

Cheruiyot won $ 140,000 in prize and bonus money, and Grigoryeva took home the $100,000 first place winner's check. 

When asked what they might do with their winnings, Cheruiyot said he might buy a supermarket back in Kenya

But the victory did not come easy for the 26 year-old.

Cheruiyot broke away from runner-up David Mandago, 30, of Kenya in the 25th mile and won the men's race by a minute and 12 seconds in 2:06:25. 

Mandago was second.

The Bank of America Chicago Marathon is an IAAF Gold Label Road Race.

Eight of the top ten men were Kenyan, while the US dominated the women's top ten with four finishers, but the Russians took the top two spots. 

Cheruiyot, Mandago, and pre-race favorite Emmanuel Mutai of Kenya broke open the race just before the half marathon mark, passing it in 1:02:27 with Mutai setting the tempo. 

The long striding Mandago and the compact, smooth striding Cheruiyot battled each other through mile 24.

Mandago opened a gap at one point, Cheruiyot noting that Mandago seemed to be running "fartlek," upping the tempo to test for weakness in Cheruiyot.  But it was Mandago who finally cracked as Cheruiyot swept past him and ran a 4:48 25th mile to pull away for good and emeergethe winner.

The women's title went to Russia's Lidiya Grigoryeva. 

The  34 year old  made her break in the 21st mile to defeat Russia's Alevtina Biktimirova, 26, by two minutes and 15 seconds in 2:27:17.

The women ran more conservatively as a pack of 12 came through the halfway mark around 1:16:03.  .

Olympic champion Constantina Dita of Romania was fourth in 2:30:57 and American Desiree Davila was fifth in a personal best 2:31:33.

For the first time the race's elite runners had a five minute head start on the field.

The change was made, said race director Carey Pinkowski, because the women had expressed frustration about men who would run too close to them during races because, they felt, many of them wanted to get on the television coverage. 

There were 33,033 official starters and 31,401 finishers.