It's A Global Affair

They come, bearing skills, to the appointed arena. And every Olympic athlete brings along another possession as well: a heritage conditioned by distinctive language, customs and geography. This haze of individuality is burned off by the heat of competition; swimmers, runners, jumpers, gymnasts, all of them, doing what they do best, can come to seem alike. That homogeneity defines, in large measure, the Olympic ideal. But the flame feeds on man's diversities as well as similarities. In this portfolio of photographs, TIME portrays some of the men and women who will be competing in Los Angeles. To see them in the places where they have grown is to recognize both a universal quest for excellence and the sustaining powers of home.

It would take stony faces indeed not to smile at the exuberance of Mary Decker. Her joy at competing seems irresistibly contagious. Says the top U.S. women's middle-distance runner: "I love to run." Some of Decker's zeal may stem from her childhood, the feuding and eventual divorce of her parents: "If you come out of things like that in the right frame of mind, you're just more competitive." Such resolve exacts a toll. Her relentless training has led to a series of injuries, including one that kept her out of the 1976 Olympics. Then came her two dramatic victories last summer at the world championships in Helsinki, making Decker, who will run only the 3,000 meters in Los Angeles, the favorite for Olympic gold.

His gladiatorial physique seems a match for the colossal arena where men once fought and died. Yet brawn alone did not make Italy's Francesco Damiani, 25, the European champion in the amateur super-heavyweight division. Much of the credit belongs to his older brother Marco, who struggled to become a world-class boxer despite the handicaps imposed by childhood polio. Realizing at last that the dream was beyond his grasp, Marco pushed the oversize, underachieving Francesco into the ring instead. Says the younger brother now: "I would love to have seen Marco prove himself, but it was not to be. He has proved himself through me." Francesco's record (69-8-2) justifies this bravado. But two of those losses have come in the past year and a half, both by decisions, both to the U.S.'s Tyrell Biggs. Francesco views a possible third combat between them in a way the ancient Roman audiences would have appreciated: "At this stage, I think I must knock out Biggs."

Is he at the peak of his powers or over the hill? Japanese Gymnast Koji Gushiken, 27, competes in a sport increasingly dominated by younger athletes. Yet the Osaka native began training four Olympiads ago. As a sixth grader viewing TV coverage of the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, he saw his countryman Sawao Kato win the gold medal in gymnastics and thought, "I have to do something like that." He took up gymnastics immediately, but his progress was slowed by two successive and serious injuries: a torn ligament in his left leg and a severed Achilles tendon. His appearance in international meets was both belated and successful. He won his first gold medal on parallel bars at the 1981 world championships in Moscow. Last year in Budapest, he finished first on rings and second in the all-round competition. Gushiken, realizing that these Olympic Games will be his first and probably last, shows formidable determination: "I didn't grow older for nothing. You'll find out at Los Angeles."

Not far from where the Olympic spirit first caught fire, Greece's Charalambos Holidis, 28, seems poised to carry the Parthenon bodily to Los Angeles. Yet the menacing pose of the Greco-Roman wrestler is only part of the picture. True, Holidis is the reigning European champion in the 57-kilo category (roughly 126 Ibs.), and he might have held the world title had he not broken a finger during last year's competition. He finished second, winning high marks for courage and determination. "You should have seen him fighting," says the president of the Greek wrestling federation. "He just refuses to give up." Yet in private, Holidis is timid and self-effacing; he speaks the language of his adopted country haltingly and plainly prefers silence. His parents emigrated from the Pontus region of Turkey when he was nine. He discovered wrestling at 13 and won a national championship within a year. His single-mindedness about his sport has led to bouts of psychological stress and fatigue. If he can grapple with himself, his coaches feel, Holidis' chances for a medal this summer are monumental.

The locale and the corkscrew stance both prompt riddles. Egypt's Muhammad Neguib, 32, did not pick up his first discus until he was 25, a good ten years older than most trainees. This seventh of ten children had played a ferocious game of volleyball until a professor of physical education noticed that the young man had the body of a discus thrower: long arms and legs, bulk (286 Ibs.) and strength (a chest circumference of 51 in.). These raw materials remain uncoached; Egypt, which has not had an Olympic medalist since 1960, spends little on developing its amateur athletes. Says Neguib: "I do not know how to get the maximum power from my body. My movements are still rough." His full-time job as a police officer in Cairo limits his daily workout to spare time. Before the Soviet-bloc pullout, Neguib guessed his average throw (203 ft.) might rank him eighth in the world, behind two Russians, two East Germans, two Americans and a Cuban. Now, eerily, he has a shot at a medal as bronze as the Sphinx.

In Kenya, a runner's high can include occasional giraffes and morning workouts at 10,000 ft. above sea level. Kipkoech Cheruiyot, 19, slashes through such dazzling surroundings as if pursued by his difficult past. He and his twin brother, Charles, were born to a woman who was the second of their neglectful father's three wives; as the third and fourth of her six children, the Cheruiyot brothers learned early that they could expect little from their immediate surroundings. So they left home at age five, scrabbled at farm work for four years and then entered Kenya's system of free primary schools. They ran barefoot races with their schoolmates, and began winning. Later, in Munich, Kipkoech set the world junior record for 1,500 meters, and Charles did the same for 5,000. After a rocky spring, Charles qualified for the Kenyan Olympic squad at the last moment. The country's hopes for a medal in middle-distance running rest most heavily on the consistent Kipkoech. Even boosters consider him a long shot. But Kipkoech, accustomed to distant horizons, is looking toward a possible U.S. college scholarship and 1988.

The eleven figures in the front may not be world famous, but there are places where they are just as familiar as the Taj Mahal. India's national field hockey team currently ranks second (behind Australia) in international competition and embodies a past as shimmering as those reflections in the pool. The first Indian team to enter the Olympics, in 1928, carried off a gold medal; five more followed in succession, and India won gold again in 1964 and 1980. Current Captain Zafar Iqbal (sixth from left) takes this legacy of triumph seriously. An engineer with Indian Airlines, he plays hard but "clean" (no on-field tantrums) and leads by example rather than exhortations. He calls teammates bhai (brother); they include Hindus, Sikhs, Anglo-Indians and Muslims, a good cross section of India's vast and still discordant nation. Factionalism fades before common purpose: to preserve the team's traditional supremacy. Says Chief Coach Balkishan Singh: "We should give our lives on the field. The rest is in the laps of the gods." And, he mentions in an afterthought, the umpires.

She was once afraid of heights. Now neither the Great Wall nor world-class diving platforms can faze China's Chen Xiaoxia. At 22 she has already spent ten years perfecting her skills. The third of six daughters of a Cantonese bean-curd maker, Chen was spotted playing in a local pool and urged to set her sights higher. She recalls, "In those days, I just liked swimming, but the coach persuaded me to try diving." After conquering her initial uneasiness, she began winning national and then international competitions, including a world championship in 1981. Her graceful acrobatics off the platform and virtually splashless entries into the water have earned her the sobriquet Flying Swallow. Appreciative fellow Chinese twice named her the nation's best athlete in yearly polls. Having over come a slump last year, Chen sticks rigorously to her formula for victory: "Keep up systematic training, even on holidays." The Los Angeles Games will provide her with the most visible platform--and biggest holiday--of all.

The castle belongs to England's reigning Queen; the loyal subject pounding the pavement outside commands other realms. Sebastian Coe, 27, holds world marks for the mile and for the 800-and 1,500-meter runs, the most regal array of records in the history of middle-distance running. He is also struggling uphill after a bout with toxoplasmosis, an infection that he contracted last year. Coe's comeback after an enforced five-month layoff will not be fully tested until he steps onto the track at Los Angeles, where he will compete in both the 800 and 1,500 meters. Coe has been training chiefly in and around London, closely supervised by his trainer-father Peter from the family home in Sheffield. The runner expects these Olympics to be his last as a competitor, but the subject may occupy his time for years to come. He is trying to complete a master's thesis on the economics and politics of track and field: "Every time I start to finish it, some joker of a country decides to boycott the Games, so there's another chapter."