FREE FLIGHT

by Valentina Kazakova

(This is an editor's summary of a long article)

Ludmila Galkina broke the seven meter barrier in the long jump at the Olympic summer games in Athens and won Russia's only gold medal. It was a surprise to everyone including the Russian team trainer who thought Galkina would be the last to get one. Back home in Saratov at the moment Ludmila (Liuda, for short) was receiving her gold medal, the whole family, their relatives and friends, and the neighbors who shared their communal apartment were all watching on television and weeping with joy. They lived in a working class district far from the center, her mother was in the railway administration and her father a truck driver on long distance hauls. At first he had grumbled bit about his daughter's intense preoccupation with sports. From her childhood Liuda remembered mainly one thing, the lack of money, the wait for payday. Big family purchases always involved a choice -- winter boots or a TV set. But it was the same for everyone they knew, so it was a shock to her when she began earning money from her achievements, until she realized that sports were not just fun but something you got paid for, like other work. Her first trip abroad in l989 to a competition in East Germany was an eye opener for the l6 year-old girl from the poor Russian provinces, to see that prosperity and abundance were there considered the norm in life. Then came trips to America, Japan, Sweden, Switzerland, England, Italy, Greece and Spain and other places. In l998 when Ludmila was 26, the author of this article talked with Liuda about her achievements and her love of sports and how it felt to come home. Together they looked at a video of Liuda's performance in Athens and Valentina Kazakova wrote that even she, who up until then been indifferent to those sports, was moved by what she saw, and she imagined what emotions Liuda herself must have felt as she competed against the best athletes in the world. Liuda talked about the mechanisms she had developed to control her emotions and in Athens these mechanisms really worked for her. "It's elementary," she told herself, "just jump as you feel like jumping, there's nobody nearby to disturb you. And I jumped over seven meters." Until then, seven had been a kind of psychological barrier for athletes. Just as she came down and her feet touched the sand that day, she felt some pain from an old injury, and she decided to forego the last optional jump, and also because she knew that no one would beat her record in Athens that day. Injuries are endemic to sports and Liuda has had her share and always tried to forget them. In a major car accident in October of l996 she miraculously suffered no serious physical injury but something almost worse, moral damage. Depression and despair, lack of confidence about her possibilities of continuing in sports -- such was still Liuda's mood at the end of l997. Then she met a doctor-psychologist, and talking with him changed her outlook and gave her new strength, and back she went to sports. The Athens victory was important to her not only in itself but because it clinched her championship at the earlier l995 winter games in Barcelona. In sports for some reason, victory at the summer games is considered more important. Yet when she won it, she felt her Russian trainers' congratulations were lukewarm, perhaps because she already had a gold medal. It wasn't until she returned home to Saratov that the welcome was really all-out. There were flags and flowers and cars and reporters, everything but an orchestra which her husband tried and failed to obtain. The mayor asked how the city could help and she had the courage to raise the problem of her apartment inconveniently far out in the factory district and where she and her husband lived with her 83 year-old grandmother. Right away a three room apartment closer in was given to her. And her dear friend who had given birth on the day of the Athens's victory named her new daughter Ludmila. Liuda soon found out why she was getting so much attention from the local authorities. They were using her victory to try and get funds from the regional government to repair the old stadium in Saratov and to send more youngsters to international competitions. They showed Ludmila off at the region's 200th birthday celebrations, lots of them, and she went along with all this, partly in return for the apartment she'd received. There was one event that spoiled her mood -- a pompously titled "Governor's Ball" in the local opera-ballet theater, which was not a ball, in fact there were hardly any women there, but a gathering of high officials. Looking out at the officials, their dress and manner of behavior, she concluded they were without real freedom and friendships and contrasted this with her sports world where she feels that individuality and talent are more valued and where she does not perceive gender discrimination. She sees that "money is very important for sportsmen because they have wives and children to feed and clothe. ... Women in sport seem happier though they don't reject these earnings. For them the sport is more a means of self expression, self affirmation." Liuda's prize in Athens was $60,000, and imagine the surprise of many when she decided to use the money to help the sports school in Saratov where she got her start -- they could not understand her generosity. First there were Russian taxes to pay, 27%, and then a payment to her trainer. The balance would go partly to send talented kids to competitions elsewhere in Russia for which the sports ministry gives very limited funds. In making plans, she consulted with her husband Sergei, a school physical education teacher whose opinion she values. She pays tribute to the patience and understanding with which he has endured her many travels and their separations. "He is not only my husband but my best friend who truly understands what sport means to me, who always helps when I get nervous or give up on something. He is so emotionally expressive that I'm never sad with him. It's with a smile that I say good-bye and greet him. If there is conflict between us, it is invariably my fault. Moreover he has become a masseur and this helped me a lot, especially after my injuries." The author of the article writes that she heard this with some skepticism -- she has never met a man who is not jealous of his wife's achievements, especially when they are in the same profession and the wife has risen so high, and their earnings are so unequal. When she expressed her skepticism, Liuda said, "It just shows that you don't know him. Without his support and understanding, I could never have achieved such results." What about when she is no longer at the top of her form, the author asked. Well, she likes working with children and when she is ready for one of her own, she won't hesitate. In spite of her earnings, Liuda still sews for herself, she hasn't gone for dressmaker clothes from the stores -- "where would I wear such things!" Clearly she is not thinking now of giving up sports. "I'll never be without work." "But at 40 you won't jump like you do at 26." "What makes you think so?" And as though knowing some secret not to be revealed, Liuda screws up her eyes and bursts out in laughter."