Bouncing Back

His

strokes were at least four centimeters shorter than those of his nearest competitor, but when Kosuke Kitajima churned the Athens pool in a frenzied quest for gold in the 100-m breaststroke race last week, Japan's finest swimmer wasn't about to let a few centimeters of European torso or American leg stop him. Tagging the end of the pool in a speedy display somewhat slowed by brisk winds, the 1.78-m Kitajima raised his arms in a banzai cheer and threw back his head as a strange wail swirled through the stadium and skittered across the surface of the pool. Delivered in a high-pitched tone perhaps best detected by dogs, the shrieks were the unmistakable call of the teenage Japanese girl. "Ko-chan, congratulations," the girls screamed in unison, waving little rising-sun flags in precise formation. "Little Ko, we love you."

Later in the week, the 21-year-old heartthrob with the intense eyes and chiseled chest captured another title in the 200-m breaststroke race. But Kitajima was hardly alone in harvesting laurels for his nation. After less than a week of competition, Japan had more than doubled its total golden haul from Sydney and had claimed the No. 3 spot in the overall gold-medal tally, trailing only the U.S. and China. In the marquee swimming races, Japan's men won four medals—four more than in Sydney, where their squad sank without a trace. The country's female swimmers also captured three medals, including a gold in the 200-m backstroke. Equally impressive, in the men's team-gymnastics final, the Japanese, whose spiky 'dos made them look as if they were sponsored by a hair-gel company, flipped past favorites China, Romania and the U.S. for a surprise win. And in judo—a sport that Japan invented and is always expected to dominate— Japanese fighters grappled their way to eight golds and two silvers, the country's best Olympic result ever.

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Despite Japan's unexpected gold rush, reaction back home has been surprisingly muted. For the first few days, the papers focused more on early disappointments in men's soccer and women's softball, sports in which Japan had hoped to win medals. True, the major dailies did print a special edition when the men's gymnastics team won gold, but the triumph was treated not so much as a watershed victory as a rightful return to the top tier. After all, before tumbling from grace in the 1980s, Japan won the men's team-gymnastics gold at five consecutive Olympics, the last at the 1976 Montréal Games. In swimming, for that matter, the country bagged 12 medals way back in 1932, five of them gold. "We're just getting back to where we were before, when we were a strong swimming nation," says Kitajima, who attributes the Olympic squad's splashy performance in Athens to their extensive technical analysis of such things as wave resistance. "I think there's a sense that we're matching our past, not surging ahead in any way."

Nevertheless, for a nation that has been mired for years in economic woes, any sign that it might be regaining its former glory is cause for celebration. The rest of the world, which had not expected a Japanese medal run, appeared to view a host of unpronounceable Japanese names in the pool as pleasant relief from over-hyped contests between the one-syllable American and Australian, Phelps and Thorpe. In the gymnastics arena, even the Americans who came in second in the men's team final could hardly begrudge the tears of joy from Mitsuo Tsukahara, a Japanese gymnast who won gold in 1976 and was now watching his son Naoya lead the 2004 tumbling squad to victory. "When I was an athlete who won, I was happy," said the elder Tsukahara. "But as a father, I am proud. And that emotion is even more powerful than just happiness." Clutching her son's victory bouquet in one hand and a bunch of bananas in the other, in case the champion needed a postcompetition potassium boost, Naoya's mother confided: "Back in 1976, I had this dream that Japan would win gold, and they did. Then, just before we left for Athens, I had another dream, where I heard the Kimigayo [the Japanese national anthem]. So I knew that we would taste success again."

For most previous Japanese Olympians, the lure of success—or, rather, the possibility of failure—has kept them locked in a Confucian pressure cooker, in which disappointing the country is the ultimate taboo. The national burden has been blamed for several high-profile Olympic chokes in previous Games, most recently Tsukahara's meltdown in Sydney, when he plunged off the pommel horse and ruined his chances of a medal in the individual all-round event. "I'm very sorry," he said, in a common refrain from Japanese Olympians. "I wish I hadn't disgraced my nation." Four years later, Tsukahara has broken free from these emotional shackles. "Yes, I'm happy for my country," he said, just minutes after accepting his first-ever Olympic gold. "But I'm also happy for my family, my coach, my friends and even myself." Teammate Hiroyuki Tomita, who nailed a spectacular 9.850 high-bar routine to clinch Japan's hairbreadth victory was even more blunt: "People say there must have been lots of pressure, but I think there's less pressure today, because there's not so much national pride depending on each victory."

The role shift for Japanese Olympians from national ambassador to individual icon is all the more dramatic, given that this year marks the 40th anniversary of the Tokyo Olympics. Back then, an ascendant economic power wanted to show just how spectacularly it had risen from the ashes of war. Japan spent $3 billion on those Games and sprinted past Germany for third place in the gold-medal count. In their patriotic frenzy, most Japanese medalists deferentially linked their victories to the country's remarkable economic rise. Still, the compulsion to reap gold for national honor sometimes proved disastrous: in 1968, a Japanese marathoner who had won bronze in the Tokyo Games committed suicide after injuries looked set to prevent him from attending the Mexico City Olympics, where he had hoped to better his third-place finish for the sake of his country. Today's Japanese youth appear to feel less obligation to prove themselves on the global stage, aware perhaps that in this new touchy-feely era, it's permissible to focus not just on serving team and country but on their own emotional well-being. "I'm glad we've turned a new page on history," says Tomita. "It's important to compete while feeling relaxed."

In some ways, though, Japan's Olympians are still restricted by a hidebound hierarchy. When their coach saunters by their training corner at the Athens Aquatic Center, members of Japan's swimming team rip off their MP3-player headphones and bob their heads in a simultaneous expression of fealty. Their coach is still called sensei, or master.

But Kitajima, with his aggressive slices through the water, is hardly a subservient stereotype. In the pool's biggest spat to date, American Aaron Piersol accused the Japanese swimmer of using an illegal dolphin kick in the 100-m breaststroke, thereby relegating Piersol's friend and fellow American Brendan Hansen to a silver. Instead of quietly turning away from the controversy, Kitajima fought back, albeit in an understated way: "The questions got me slightly angry," he told reporters, noting that he had never been warned about any prohibited kicks in previous international competitions. "But I don't take them seriously." Regardless, Piersol's griping was somewhat undercut later in the week when the Texan was briefly disqualified for a questionable turn in the 200-m backstroke, before his gold was reinstated 20 minutes later. But Kitajima's ultimate revenge came a couple days after his 100-m triumph, when he cruised to victory in the 200-m competition, with an Olympic record time of 2:09.44. "That talk of the kick just motivated me more," he said. "They can stop talking now." Instead, all of Japan can start celebrating.