From Stillness Comes Swiftness

On July 14, 1983, in Los Angeles, a light breeze and Vladimir Salnikov's 11th world-record performance, in the 800-freestyle, still wrinkled the surface of the Olympic swimming pool when two men met. The American, Mark Spitz, thrust out his hand. The Soviet, Salnikov, accepted it. The most effective fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscles in swimming history contracted against one another and then relaxed.

"Congratulations, Vladimir. I'm glad you weren't swimming when I was," said Spitz. His videogenic smile dismissed the fact that he and Salnikov were lords of different distances: Spitz's seven gold medals at the 1972 Olympics were all won in sprints of 100 or 200 meters; Salnikov is the world-record holder in the 400-, 800-and 1,500-meter freestyles.

Then the American asked the Soviet swimmer to come to his Beverly Hills home for dinner. "He couldn't come," Spitz said later. "They didn't want him to see what I had and how I lived."

Funny how societies differ the same way muscles do, fast-twitch and slow-twitch. "Mark Spitz is a national hero," says Salnikov. "I am not so much famous because he has done more than me, and also because Americans like heroes more than us. They are more in a hurry to be somebody than us; they are more driven than us. They even have the Guinness Book of World Records so they have slots to fit all their achievements in. You won't see anyone in Russia trying to beat the record for dragging a bed around their house."

Fast-twitch and slow-twitch countries wouldn't seem to understand each other—to the extreme that now they won't even pause and play games once every four years. But Salnikov understood: By merging the best of both cultures he became the greatest distance freestyler ever, though doomed by back-to-back boycotts not to have his career crowned with victories in a full-scale Olympics.

Efforts to reach him last week and learn his reaction to the latest Olympic boycott were unavailing.

The strongest of all warriors are these two—Time and Patience.
—LEO TOLSTOY

Let's go. Watch our smoke. Excuse our dust....

Speed, speed, we are the makers of speed.
—CARL SANDBURG

Salnikov's beige compact pulls up in front of the Olympic pool in Moscow and loses itself in a parking lot full of nondescript four-wheel boxes. He reaches out, disengages the outside mirror from his door and places it inside. Car theft is unconscionable in his country, but parts are so scarce that any removable accessory is fair game. Salnikov feels fortunate to have the little car; all his teammates arrive by bus.