THERE'S GOLD IN THEM STATES

Why are small powers rising? One clear reason is the fall of the Soviet Union, which freed nations like Ukraine, Belarus, and Bulgaria, all double-digit medal winners in Sydney. Another is rising wealth and population. Yet another is IOC funding for international camps that cater to athletes from small nations. Whatever the key, light- and middleweight states provide some of the most compelling stories of the Games. Some of our favorites follow below.

IRAQ | THE NIGHTMARE ENDS

Baghdad's shops were shuttered, its dusty streets deserted. Finally, the crack of AK-47s rent the silence that sweltering afternoon last month. It was celebratory gunfire--the Iraqi national soccer team had scored its first goal in what would prove a 2-1 victory over Saudi Arabia.

Iraqis love their soccer. And you can bet most of the country will be watching again when the men's national team takes the field in Athens. True, the team had to play its home Olympic qualifying matches in Jordan: their old stadium was being used as a tank parking lot. The coffers are bare, looted by former National Olympic Committee chairman Uday Hussein. But things are looking up for Iraq's sports teams. In January, a new chairman took over the National Olympic Committee: Ahmed al-Samarrai is a former Olympian, with none of his predecessor's enthusiasm for beating, jailing and torturing athletes. About 30 Iraqis will march in this week's opening ceremonies. They include a boxer, a weightlifter and Iraq's first female Olympian since 1988.

The Coalition Provisional Authority and the IOC have ponied up millions to help out. Al-Samarrai has also taken a page from America and sought corporate sponsors. The soccer team has signed two-year deals with South Korean, Egyptian and Danish companies. Negotiations with Nike and Motorola derailed in April, when citizens of Fallujah dragged several U.S. contractors through the streets and hung their battered corpses from a bridge. Even so, a new era for Iraqi athletes has begun.

CUBA | EVEN CASTRO IS CRACKING

As the Cuban national team set off for Athens, state television broadcast an Olympic special. A top sports official ran off stats on the team--number of competitors, percentage of women--but one detail stood out. More than 80 percent are "integrated within the revolution," meaning they are Communist Party members, or on their way to joining. "Homeland or death," the athletes chant, as they are handed national flags to take to the Games.

In Cuba, sport is still cold-war politics. Yet even here, the last unreconstructed communist sports machine is tinkering with reform at the margin. Without Soviet funding, the centralized infrastructure channeling young talent to national teams is in decay. Inside the vast Pan American Stadium, Cuba's Olympic athletes train under rusting floodlights, cracking grandstands and a billboard of Che Guevara.

To keep its sporting dreams alive, Cuba in 1991 set up a company called Cubadeportes. It is, in effect, the commercial wing of the Sports Ministry. It contracts Cuban sports advisers to 45 countries, acts as travel agent to foreign teams visiting Cuba and arranges for Cubans to serve stints as pros abroad (keeping most of their earnings). It has sent Olympic gold-medal-winning baseball player Omar Linares to Japan, and top volleyball stars to Italy.

In part, this outlet is intended to reduce the rate of defections. Cuba says that at international events, foreign agents besiege stars like its big contenders in Athens, from Osleidys Menendez in the javelin to long jumper Ivan Pedroso. Cuba also says most of its athletes would not dream of defecting, even though top stars officially earn the standard state salary of $15 a month. Just to make sure, this year the Cuban baseball team made an oath before it left for Athens. The players promised to reject "any offer attacking Cuban principles."

Stephen Gibbs

KENYA | THE MAGIC OF ELDORET

High in the Kenyan hills is the town of Eldoret and its famous "Runners' Row," where world champions live side by side in brightly painted mansions. In 1998 one of Kenya's most revered Olympians opened his Kip Keino Training Center here. In 2002, with $50,000 from the IOC, he built a new training facility, offering a gym, physiotherapy room and housing facilities, making it the premier training ground for any serious Olympic hopeful. Parked outside the stone farmhouse is a Daimler-Benz van stenciled with PARTNER OF IOC.

The Keino camp is one of many new training centers backed by the IOC to give small nations an affordable shot at making the Games. There are two others African centers, in Senegal and Mauritius, but the Keino Center is the granddad: it trained a dozen competitors for Athens, including Kenya's Ezekiel Kemboi, Sudan's Ismail Ahmed Ismail and Burundi's Arthemon Hatungimana.

Keino can take up to 50 guests at $30 to $50 a day, including room, board, coaching and free fraternizing with famous running neighbors like Moses Tanui. That makes the Keino center big business by Kenyan standards. Its success has spawned so many imitators in this thriving capitalist society that the national sports governing body is setting up a committee to regulate conditions and standards. None of the rivals can boast the magic name of Eldoret, but Keino says it's secret is simple: "Hard work."