Listening to Scherbo, it’s clear that athletes are no longer royalty. “My salary is not even enough to buy gas,” says Scherbo, who receives a few thousand rubies a month from the commonwealth Olympic committee. He hated the training center at Round Lake. “We’re far from Moscow, the phone doesn’t work. There are no bars, discos or films.” The meat didn’t taste good, and there weren’t enough foods with the vitamins he wanted, such as caviar, fruit or salads. Scherbo says his best events are the free program and the vault. Despite his kvetching, he predicts he’ll win at Barcelona because “we are competing for ourselves now.”
title: “Gymnastics” ShowToc: true date: “2023-01-13” author: “Jim Osmun”
That rivalry may presage Barcelona, where Boginskaya’s toughest competitor will most likely be Kim Zmeskal from Houston. Stylistically, Boginskaya and Zmeskal are polar opposites, one lean and graceful, the other short and muscular. The dancer and the athlete. Coach Aleksandrov, not surprisingly, thinks Boginskaya has the advantage. “She who is beautiful Is a pleasure to watch,” he says. Time for famous Baltic folk saying: Beauty, Coach, Is In the eye of the beholder.
