By Phillip Whitten

Lenny Krayzelburg: The Newest American Champion

Ultimately, Lenny Krayzelburg, who became a U.S. citizen in 1995, would like to become America's newest Olympian and Olympic gold medalist.

Lenny Krayzelburg—the name sounds made-up, like it should belong to a rock star. And with his classic, California-surfer good looks, Lenny looks the part. But though he's a star, Lenny is no rock musician. The recent University of Southern California grad is a double world swimming champion, an American record holder, and with his Horatio Alger rags-to-riches story, one of the hottest properties in the sport today.

That's why Lenny's story will be featured on Turner Television during the Goodwill Games to be held in New York July 30-Aug. 2.

Lenny Krayzelburg was born on Sept. 28, 1975 in Odessa—that's Odessa as in the late, unlamented USSR, not Odessa as in Texas—the first child of Oleg and Yelena Krayzelburg. The Krayzelburgs were middle-class in Russia's classless society: Oleg owned a coffee shop, and Yelena worked as an accountant at a shoe factory. But, in the USSR, especially because they are Jewish, their horizons were limited. Oleg and Yelena longed for a better life for Lenny and his sister Marsha in America.

Lenny started swimming with a Red Army club in Odessa at the age of 5. "I really liked it," Lenny recalls, "especially because all of the kids in my class at school were on the team." He also liked the fact that his dad took a great interest in his swimming, attending many of the team's practice sessions.

By the time he was 8, his coach, Vitaly Ovakimian, told his dad that Lenny was destined to become a great backstroker. Within two years, Coach Ovakimian's predictions appeared to be right on the mark. Competing in the Soviet age group championships at age 10, Lenny finished second. He repeated his silver-medal performances the next two years.

On To America
That's when opportunity knocked. Years after applying, the Krayzelburgs unexpectedly received an exit visa. Shortly thereafter, in March 1989, they were on their way to America with stops in immigration camps in Austria and Italy along the way.

Thirteen-year-old Lenny was excited. "I'd always heard America was the greatest country," he recalls with only the faintest trace of an accent, "but I didn't really have any preconceptions. I never believed the propaganda we'd always heard about how America wanted to make war against the Russian people."

By the time young Lenny arrived in the U.S., he'd already gotten a taste of what the Western world was like. "My first impressions of America were that it was much more relaxed, more laid back than Russia. In Russia, people are more conservative."

Speaking only a few words of English, Lenny finished the eighth grade in Los Angeles. He also joined Team Santa Monica, planning on pursuing his dream of becoming an Olympian. But both his parents worked 50 hours or more a week—Oleg as a cook and Yelena as a pharmacy assistant—and they did not have enough money for a car. So Lenny took the city bus to practice—a 45-minute ride each way, then a walk of eight blocks through an area that, says Lenny in an understatement, "was not one of the best neighborhoods in the world.

"My parents would wait for me at the bus stop, and I'd get home at 9 or 9:30. It got to be pretty dreary," he recalls, "and that's when I stopped loving swimming.

"I was nervous, tired, losing weight. So my dad sat me down, and we talked things out. We decided to look for a closer team."

A Positive Change
That team was the Westside Jewish Community Center team in Los Angeles. Lenny joined the team, and swimming quickly became a pleasure again. Swimming at the JCC helped his English, too: "I got used to hearing the same words over and over, and that provided the foundation for my learning English."

But Westside was not "a serious team," and Lenny recalls that he swam "mainly to stay in shape." There was also the problem of school (Fairfax High didn't have a team) and his need to work 30 hours a week at the City of West Hollywood Recreation Department to help support his struggling family. Still, even swimming only four times a week, for just an hour or so each session, he had posted times of :54 and 1:53 in the 100 and 200 yard backstroke events. Clearly, the high school senior had potential. What he needed was a break.

That break came in the second semester of Lenny's senior year in high school. When the JCC pool closed for repairs, Lenny and a friend decided to train with the Southern California Aquatic Masters team (SCAQ) nearby, where one of the two head coaches was Gerry Rodrigues.

Gerry, too, was an immigrant—he had come to L.A. from his native Trinidad as a college freshman to swim at Pepperdine University. "I saw a tremendous amount of potential in Lenny," says Gerry, who now is co-publisher of Swimming World as well as head coach of the UCLA Bruins Masters team. "He had good technique, he learned quickly and he was willing to work hard."

"Gerry was always giving me a tip or two—on stroke, on pacing, on strategy," Lenny remembers. Gerry became Lenny's mentor, and the two became fast friends.

Gerry introduced Lenny to Stu Blaumkin, coach of the men's team at Santa Monica College. "Stu enrolled me in some classes at SMCC during the second semester of my senior year," says Lenny, "and I began to train with the team." He stayed at Santa Monica for only a year, but it was a productive year. "There was a good group of guys, mostly older," says Lenny, "and I continued to improve."

Indeed he did. He won two California junior college titles back in 1994, taking the 100 back in 50.74 and the 200 in 1:47.91, a junior college national record that stood until this year. He was also named men's swimmer of the meet.

Rodrigues then introduced Lenny to Mark Schubert, coach of the University of Southern California Trojans. "Despite all he'd achieved, I could tell Lenny was still very raw," says Schubert. "But I knew he had great potential."

So in 1995, Lenny accepted a scholarship and transferred to USC. Under NCAA rules, he was unable to train with his college team for a semester, so three or four times a week, Rodrigues got in the water and the two trained together—Lenny swimming backstroke, Gerry freestyle.

Lenny kept his eye on the prize and kept improving. In 1995, he was named "Rookie of the Meet" at the USS summer nationals in Pasadena, Calif., placing tenth in the 200 meter backstroke (2:02.50) and 14th in the 100 (57.12). That fall, after refusing an offer to swim in the 1996 Olympics for Ukraine, he became an American citizen.

Who Is This Guy?
Six months later, Lenny—still a virtual unknown—showed up at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Indianapolis and proceeded to qualify second in a lifetime best (2:00.49) in the prelims of the 200 back. USS officials scurried around, frantically trying to dig up some biographical information for the media on the kid with the funny name. "Who is this guy?" asked USS media coordinator Matt Farrell, plaintively. "Does anyone know anything about him?"

In the finals, an inexperienced Lenny—he had only swum the 200 backstroke long course four or five times before—finished fifth (2:00.72), as his training partner, Brad Bridgewater, won, earning a berth on the Olympic squad and eventually going on to win in Atlanta.

Lenny's performances seemed spectacular to everyone but himself. "Yeah," he says, "I was confident I would swim fast because I was staying with Brad in practice. But I went in with the attitude that I would simply go for it because I had nothing to lose. In the finals, though, I don't think I really realized I had a chance of making the Olympic team."

Not making the team was disappointing, but only for a short while. Says Lenny: "I didn't dwell on it. I was happy that I'd swum a personal best. I felt that it just wasn't my time yet, but I knew my time would come."

His time came quickly. That summer, Lenny took both backstroke events at USS nationals, swimming personal best times of 56.11 and 1:59.37. But the big breakthrough came in 1997. That's when Lenny got on a roll...and he's kept on a-rollin' ever since.

At the 1997 NCAA Championships, Lenny took the 200 yard back in 1:41.10, the third-fastest time in history, despite the fact that it was his 14th swim of the three-day meet.

At summer nationals in Nashville, he swept both backstrokes, again dropping his times to 54.69 and 1:58.04. The latter was an American record, and to win, he had to beat Bridgewater. The newest American was now the newest American record holder.

Less than two weeks later at the Pan Pacific Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, he did it again: winning the 100 in 54.43 and lowering his still-wet American record in the 200 to 1:57.87. He took a three-day "break," and then was back into heavy training. At year's end, he was ranked first in the world in both dorsal events.

World Champion
Eighteen months of non-stop training probably had taken its toll, but last January in Perth, Lenny accomplished the goal he had set for himself two years earlier: he won both backstroke events at the World Championships. The newest American was now the newest American world champion.

After the second gold, an elated Lenny summed it up: "At this stage in my career, it doesn't get much better than this. I would like to have swum faster, but I realize that at this level, what it's all about is getting your hand on the wall first."

Cheering Lenny on in Perth were his mentor, Rodrigues, and his family, who used the money they had saved for a visit to friends and relatives in Russia to travel to Perth. "Of course we came to Australia to see Lenny swim," said his dad, Oleg, in heavily-accented English, as if it were nothing for a family of limited means to travel halfway around the globe. "We'll visit Russia next year, or the year after."

To those who know Lenny and his family well, it was no surprise to see Oleg, Yelena and Marsha cheering in the jam-packed Challenger Swim Stadium in Perth. Family is very important to the Krayzelburgs. They are a tight-knit family.

"That's a major difference I see between the U.S. and Russia," Lenny comments. "In Russia, people are very family-oriented, and that's the way my family is. I really like to spend time with my parents and sister, but most of the kids who grow up in America can't wait to move out and be independent. I would say one of the major things missing in American culture is a real sense of the importance of family."

During the school year, Lenny went home almost every weekend, looking forward to family dinners on Friday and Saturday nights. After graduation, he moved back home, where he plans to stay at least through 1999.

Focus On Sydney
Lenny currently is negotiating an endorsement deal with a major swimsuit manufacturer, again with the advice and help of his mentor. But his focus is fixed firmly on Sydney 2000.

"My main goal, my dream, is to make the Olympic team in 2000," he says, "and to win gold." In the meantime, he plans to concentrate on "little goals": getting more racing experience, improving his times, winning at the Goodwill Games, at nationals and on the World Cup circuit. He also plans to work on his underwater kick. Ultimately, he'd like to break the world record.

"And," he says, "I plan to learn the strategies of every possible competitor in 2000—that will give me the edge."

Lenny is working hard to reach these lofty goals. Coach Schubert shared why he believes Lenny will attain them: "A month ago, one of my swimmers was complaining about a particularly tough set. But Lenny said, 'Hard sets don't ever bother me because I know in two hours, the workout will be over. And how much can it hurt in two hours?' "

Now that's a golden attitude.