Cheered on by a wildly whooping and whistling crowd of 70,000, the United States' Bruce Jenner grimaced his way across the finish line late last Friday afternoon to claim the one Olympic honor more precious than gold: the title of "the world's greatest athlete."
With the waning light shining on his flapping chestnut hair, the beautifully sculpted Jenner had powered his way through the 1,500 meters, the last of the ten labors that make up the taxing, two-day decathlon competition. Too uproariously happy to notice that he had left several contestants crumpled about him in pain on the track, Jenner jogged, danced and leaped through his victory lap. Then embracing his tearfully grinning wife Chrystie, he exulted: "It's all over. We did it!" With the single-minded ambition that distinguishes Olympic champions—a characteristic that the two-week extravaganza in Montreal brought vividly to an audience of a billion people—the 26-year-old Jenner had achieved a goal set four years ago at Munich: that he would beat Soviet Champion Nikolai Avilov in 1976.
A fierce beating it was. By the end of the first day, the only question that remained was by how much Jenner would break Avilov's world record of 8,454. The powerfully built (6 ft. 2 in., 195 lb.) Jenner had run faster, thrown farther and jumped higher and longer than ever in his life. "I'm sitting pretty," he said, with typical elan. "All I have to do is show up tomorrow."
Avilov, now 28 and competing in his third Olympics, seemed nonplused; he had achieved personal bests in three of the first day's five events, but to little avail. At one point while loosening up he threw back his head like a high-spirited trotter and passed Jenner without a glance. Perhaps he was thinking that hubris such as Jenner's classically precedes defeat. But Jenner, a camera-courting athlete who thinks Montreal may lead to Hollywood, is a blithe and buoyant modern man. FEET, DON'T FAIL ME NOW read the baby blue T shirt that he wore instead of his official red warm-up top. And they did not.
Total Artistry. On Friday, Jenner roared through the five final events with a combination of speed and strength almost incomparably greater than any decathlon man before him. Smashing Avilov's record by 164 points, Jenner surpassed the long-presumed Olympic absolute of 8,500 points to score an astounding 8,618. Avilov, with 8,367 points, even gave up the silver medal, which went to West Germany's Guido Kratschmer.
"It takes a decathlon athlete to truly appreciate what Jenner has done," summed up 1968 Decathlon Gold Medalist Bill Toomey. "It was total artistry, a beautiful composition." Citing the controlled intensity of Jenner's performance, Toomey added: "He was like a hand grenade ready to explode. And he held the pin until the Olympics. He was hungry, extremely motivated. That element was missing from a lot of American performances."