About athletes

By the way, in childhood, I was leaving for the football “Spartak”, I knew the nazuke of the main and duplicate compositions, and wrote out “Soviet sport”. The player’s transitions from the team to the team rarely happened and were perceived as treason. I wore a red sweater with a white strip on my chest and with curtained elbows.

I ceased to be interested in football and other gaming sports in the 90s of the twentieth century, when the composition of the teams began to mow once a quarter. The players began to not remember, the team that was richer by the owners won. What is the excitement here! That is why I am writing about those people who ran away their long ago. I am sorry that I lost emotions that can no longer be returned.

***

At school No. 59 named after Gogol, we had a good handball team, once we even won the third place in the big city - Moscow, which I am still proud of. But you need to know your place. There was another player among our rivals - Seryoga Chikalaev, a formidable Chica. He played in another dimension. Chika jumped over our defensive gearbox, wringing a twig of a twitching hand behind his back, then with a crunch of my face, he threw her down, the ball whistled over a flimsy fence, dissected the space like a cast -iron nucleus, his flight could not be seen. When you looked in fright at the miserable gate, painted in the border strip, the ball had long been trembling in the exhausted grid, the goalkeeper guilty of us, perhaps, dropped a tear, picked up the ball from the floor and doomedly threw it back into the field. Only then, in order to get into trouble again in a minute. Chika again took off into Zenit and grimaced.

Having grown up a little, our school team scattered through institutions and weights, and Chikalaev continued to push the balls around the country and the world, was the seven -time champion of the USSR. What he did after the completion of his sports career was unknown to me. Our paths diverged, it is unlikely that he caught my eye of my books. And just recently, I scored his name in the search engine and found out that he had already died. I learned this from a single necrologist. Having listed the titles and victories of Chikalaev, the author finished as follows: "He possessed a confident cystic throw." Not “wonderful”, not “outstanding”, but simply “confident”. The author of the necrologist was not an enthusiastic person. I don’t know how many goals Chika scored in his life, but the score goes thousands. And he died like everyone else - from heart failure.

***

She was a professional gymnast in the Dynamo society. But there were not officially professionals in Soviet sports, so it was attributed to the fire brigade. “I only received a salary there, I went to the winners in Moscow.” Now - a fire safety instructor, under seventy, red lips, a red dress of fifty -fourth size. Hair is bleaching with perhydros. She instructed me when I got to work. In the office there are fire extinguishers, hoses, barrels of water and sand, a lonely trunk. On the wall is a terrible picture of the great Marinist Aivazovsky “Fire in Moscow of 1812”. "I love, you know, art and bright colors." Instead of briefing, the gymnast began to remember how young and beautiful she was. “Do you know how many fans I had? I was thin, the figure is chiseled. Even the Olympic champion in my trampoline looked after me. You know how he jumped high! From Kazakhstan, he needed a Moscow residence permit. " At heart, I doubted it - jumping on a trampoline entered the Olympic program only in 2000, at that time I could hardly talk about a chisly figure. But he was silent. Not hearing an exclamation of admiration, the instructor lost interest in me. “Do you have children? Or at least grandchildren? Let them not indulge with matches. ” Despite the friendly attitude, I did not prudently ask about her children. He knew that the gymnasts had insoluble problems with this. “It stinks of you from you. Just do not smoke in bed, please. "

***

Black heavy weight boxer Mike Tyson was the real champion - 44 knockouts, biting in the ring, raped behind the ring. And what tattoos are a sight for sore eyes! Here you have a fierce Mao, and the serial killer of Che Guevara, and the cannibal tiger.

Tyson was nicknamed with an iron T -shirt, but the iron is eventually tired, for the T -shirt, fresh peaceful life came. But how to satisfy your fierce after the end of a glorious career, during which you managed to mutilate so many people? Where, besides the ring, is it officially allowed to fight to blood, to assure and even receive money for it? Mike was thinking tightly and decided to become an actor - in the end to fulfill his dream and play Othello, that is, strangle the white -skinned Desdemona. Still, in the ring he had to mutate mainly blacks, there was little white white on the championship path. He even bit his ear at the unfortunate black man. Even the girl he raped was black. And I wanted something big and white.

With an unusual modesty, Tyson admitted that he had not yet grown up to the theater and prefers to star in the role of Othello in the cinema, but we, by this reservation, are accurately guessing: he dreamed of theatrical stage. In order for the murder to be committed more often, preferably - every evening. But the case did not burn out with the cinema. The directors throughout America cynically told the champion: “White Lives Matter” - and did not give the roles of Othello. It is as if linching of blacks is one thing, and to strangle the Desdemona is another. It turned out dishonestly, not in a lovely, not in a nasal, not noting.

***

Once upon a time, in 1974, I did not study Tokai at Japanese University together with my fellow students. And now the women's basketball team of the Leningrad Spartak, the then union champion, arrived at the university. To begin with, in the afternoon, the girls got off with the university men's team. Against the backdrop of sharp guys, any champions look like a slow dance performers, so the victory was difficult - they saved distant throws in which ours were clearly more trained. Let's not forget that the professionals met with amateurs.

Having taken a shower, Leningrades went to an evening meeting with the Japanese champions, grabbing us students as a support group. I sat on the bus next to the two -meter center, which was not placed in the human seat, so I lifted my knees above the backs of the seats. Turning and stunning, she asked where to buy her “shoes”. It had sneakers of forty -fourth size, and at that time not in any Japanese shoe store was found thirty -sixth. So I could not help the center practical advice. She was disappointed with my miserable knowledge.

At the installation before the game, the coach warned his wards: “Do not run into the gap, not to win a lot - a maximum of 10 points, otherwise they will never call us here again.” The difference in the class was really huge, but Leningrades courageously held themselves in their hands, maintaining a small difference in the score. But the excitement is excitement-one Spartakovka still could not resist and rushed into the gap. When she was already approaching the three -second zone free from rivals, the coach jumped up from the bench and frantically yelled at her. Of all his tirade, only the appeal "You, bitch!" It was printed. The athlete heard the coach, obediently turned 180 degrees and at full speed rushed with the ball into her half. The hall was by no means sporting silence: the audience was perplexed regarding the meaning of such a cunning maneuver. It’s good that Spartakovka did not hit her ring with fright. As a result, ours won with the approving occasion, everyone was satisfied.

After the game, a buffet was held, reporters besieged Nadezhda Zakharov, one of the best playing in the world. Journalists were interested in what to do in order to learn how to play so cool. Having chewing the sandwich, Nadezhda mumbled: "You need to pass more precisely." Journalists disappointedly thought that a secretive athlete concealed her female secret from them, but this is not so. Any poet or artist will confirm this to you. You need to compose better, draw - more talented, pass - more precisely. And no one knows how to learn this.

Alexander Meshcheryakov