It has been clear for some time that regardless of wars or celebrities, 1984 will be a remarkable news year for Americans. Presidential politics will dominate the scene. The long countdown to the November elections is already well begun as the race to become Ronald Reagan's Democratic challenger fills columns of print and hours on the air waves. The summertime conventions seem only a blink away. But July will bring another memorable event: the XXIII Olympiad, the largest Olympic Games ever organized and the first Summer Games held in the U.S. in 52 years. And almost as a prelude comes the first spectacular, the Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia. There the U.S. is thrusting into competition its most balanced and impressive team ever, one that stars the 1983 world's top-ranked man and woman skiers as well as America's ever formidable skaters.

How should TIME react to such a richness of events? The magazine's answer: a "bonus" for TIME'S readers of up to 100 color-filled extra pages of editorial content specifically directed to 1984's very special demands. With these additional capabilities, which will cost nearly $2 million, TIME will be taking an unprecedented step toward giving its readers the dramatic detail and pictorial splendor that are a vital part of the events that define our interests and shape our times. TIME'S new bonus approach to big news will be used for two Winter Olympics issues, three during the Summer Olympics and two for the political conventions, as well as for any surprise major news event.

TIME begins its bonus coverage this week with a special report on the Winter Olympics, a 24-page section--more than double the length of the average TIME cover--on the men and women who will compete for the U.S. in the first Olympics of 1984.

This week's special section was put together by TIME'S own Winter Olympics team, 31 editors, writers, photographers, correspondents and reporter-researchers.

Among them is Atlanta Correspondent B. J. Phillips, who has been with U.S. figure skaters and will follow them to Yugoslavia.

The person working on the project longest is Eastern Europe Bureau Chief John Moody, who has been observing preparations in Sarajevo for months, and is now ensconced there in one of the rooms that will accommodate TIME'S team at the Pension Bob, an aptly named hotel near the Olympic bobsled run. Says Moody: "I'm beginning to feel as much a host here as the natives, saying welcome to newcomers and feeling very much at home."

A lot of excited newcomers are on the way to see him.