The Joy of Taking Part

Beyond the satisfaction of a hard-fought victory, the stirring sound of national anthems and the glint of the medals, there is something more to an Olympics, a warming sense best displayed by the athletes who have no hope of placing in the top three, perhaps even the top 30, but nonetheless go home winners.

When Bonny came sliding home

Bonny Warner, 21, a U.S. luge racer, crashed in her third run and skidded agonizingly to the finish. "Until then I was in eighth place," she said proudly, ahead of the two kindly West Germans who had taught her from scratch since she first observed a luge race in 1980. Her left side was scraped raw ("my Olympic souvenir"), but none of her enthusiasm rubbed off. "The Olympics haven't just been all that I hoped, they're more. Maybe the American luge team didn't win any medals, but medals aren't what the Olympics are all about. We're cracking the top ten, and that's nice." A few days ago, a Yugoslav said to her, "Think of it, you're the 15th best in the whole world." Think of it.

"The people, they all gone"

When the best Yugoslav ski jumper, Primoz Ulaga, 21, took his turn on the 70-meter sliding board, the pines of Malo Polje seemed outnumbered by fans. The hills echoed with "U-lah-gah, U-lah-gah," probably the loudest timpani in all the long history of men and banana peels. The amazing noise brought Ulaga out of the chute splendidly, but the track's icy grooves were too narrow to contain such enthusiasm. Backing up in mid-air like a duck in the path of buckshot, Ulaga flapped in every direction until he put down gracelessly 100 ft. short of expectation. "One leg go like this, one leg go like that," he said, "and the people, they all gone." It was an Olympic record for clearing a forest. As the home crowd headed back to Sarajevo, whistling derisively, Ulaga said, "You are man, you are not machine, you can make mistakes. They shouldn't have left. In the spirit of the Olympics, they should have stayed to watch the others."

Ice-cream cones in the freeze

Demonstrating his passion for cold, Lamine Gueye, 23, an Alpine skier from sub-Sahara Africa who went on from water skiing after moving to Paris, was standing outside on the bitterest day of the Games eating two ice-cream cones at once. As the one-man Olympic team from Senegal, he suffers people's curiosity with a pleasant shrug. "I'm black and I'm a ski racer and I'm Senegalese and I'm tall, but I wish that I could just be a ski racer. I'm crazy about the downhill," he said. "It's a great feeling." Gueye finished 51st.

Ms. Flying Golden Snow

"I'm proud to represent my country," said Chinese Alpine Skier Wang Guizhen, 23. "Our level is not high, but I took part in the Lake Placid Games and I feel we've made some progress." Well, some ... She placed 18th in the 1980 giant slalom, but tangled with a gate in the first run at Sarajevo and was disqualified. Said Jin Xuefei, 20, also on the Chinese women's team (her name means "flying golden snow"): "Our aim at the Olympics is to study athletes from other countries, especially the American women." What of the future? The young women smiled. "Time," they say in unison, "drills holes in stones."

Subtropical bobsledding

They saw their first bobsled race, on television, during the Innsbruck Games in 1976--and they were hooked. Bobsledding on Taiwan? On a subtropical island? "People stare at us a lot," says one Taiwan delegate. Undeterred, Wu Chung-chou, 27, and his brother Wu Dien-cheng, 25, keep in shape running and lifting weights and come to race in key European competitions. Their major complaint: lack of up-to-date equipment. They drive an old Italian-made two-man sled. "The equipment of all the participants should be the same," said the younger Wu. "But for a country without a bobsled course we are content with our results." They placed 26th out of 27.

From the cave to the slopes

Speaking as the only Egyptian entrant, Jamil el Reedy said, "I was a little bummed out that I fell in the giant slalom, but that's O.K." Born in Cairo, raised in Plattsburgh, N.Y., El Reedy, 18, prepared mentally for the Games by following his father's wishes and holing up in a desert cave for 40 days. No one on Bjelasnica had a more intimate knowledge of scorpions. "When I got here, I expected a lot more 'Look at him' stuff from the others. But instead they've all been helping me. 'Look out for this bump.' 'Make sure you get low there.' " El Reedy was sent off last in the downhill. "They are worried about a crackup from behind," he smiled. He wiped out more spectacularly than ever, but climbed back up on his skis wonderfully to finish--some two minutes behind Bill Johnson. "I'll try again in 1988," El Reedy promised. "The Olympics brings people together. It's a short-term peace."