The phrase "a front runner of" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe someone or something that is leading in a competition or is a leading candidate in a particular context.
Example: "In the race for the championship, she has emerged as a front runner of the competition."
Alternatives: "a leading contender" or "a top candidate".
Through the Surface, competed with 700 projects before being chosen as a top-ten finalist and a front runner for the grant of $50,000.
BioShock was considered a front runner to be displayed because of its status as a game that demonstrated how artistic the medium can be.
And to a certain point this will also be a front runner for the property development of the Albanian coast.
As his fellow scholars, we would like to express our deepest gratitude for his leading role as a front-runner of sex determination studies in fish and express our devout wishes for his health and for his long life.
Conservatives now face a choice between a front-runner of no lasting convictions -- who has lost campaigns for two out of three major offices he has previously run for and who champions a predatory capitalism that applauds layoffs when jobs are the primary issue -- against a divided group of second-tier candidates that may be the weakest field in the history of presidential politics.
His magnanimity may have been the calculated strategy of a front runner, but it gave him an air of being above the fray.
GTi's main 956 entry, however, remained a front runner in the hands of Lammers and John Fitzpatrick.
A front-runner for secretary of state appears to be Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Democrats said worries about losing his Senate seat to the Republicans in a special election had diminished with Tuesday's victories.
Damani Ralph, a front-runner for rookie of the year in M.L.S., scored the only goal with a right-footed shot from 10 yards after a pass by Evan Whitfield in the 68th minute.
