Walker Is Ready to Make His Push : Bobsled: Viking running back is taking his quest for a gold medal very seriously.

The black cap with the ear flaps up was tied tightly under Herschel Walker’s chin as he stood all bundled up in a corner of the bobsleigh garage, known up here in the French Alps by its other name--the sled shed.

Outside, snow was blowing sideways, dusting the pine trees. A thin crust of melting snow had collected on Walker’s headgear, which didn’t look at all like what he normally wears on the job. The one with the Viking horns on the sides.

Walker, the former Heisman Trophy winner, held an impromptu news conference Thursday and again proclaimed his eagerness to expand his athletic achievements to include something like a gold medal in bobsled.

“Herschel is going to be a master of this sport,” U.S. Coach John Philbin said.

The U.S. bobsled team hasn’t won an Olympic medal since getting a bronze in 1956, but there is a growing feeling that if anyone is able to change the direction of the U.S. fortunes, Walker is the guy.

“Once he gets his 220 pounds in there and those hips, that sled is going to come out of the hole like a jet,” Philbin said. “He’s lethal.”

Walker will make his Olympic debut Saturday when the first two runs of the two-man bobsled competition are held on the 19-turn ice chute. The U.S. team is expecting a lot, but then so is Walker.

“If we win, it means we have accomplished what we are here for,” said Walker, the brakeman for driver Brian Shimer in USA I. “I don’t want to clown around.

“Some Swiss reporter asked me if I thought we could finish as high as sixth. I thought that was a dumb question. There’s no sense thinking about trying to finish sixth. If you are, you might as well not show up.

“That’s what I told the guys on the team. They’d better be ready.”

Shimer and Walker seem to be capable of a medal performance, although they also have posted some wildly varying training times.

On Wednesday, USA I produced the top combined time after two runs, which was significant because some of the top European teams were using the heats as their Olympic trials.

But USA I followed that with an 11th-place finish in a practice run Thursday morning. Heavy snowfall canceled the last of the practice runs but apparently did nothing to dim Shimer’s optimism.

A brakeman on the sled that placed fourth at Calgary in 1988, Shimer decided to move up to the front of the sled and became a driver. He said someone asked him shortly afterward whom he would choose if he could pick any brakeman in the world.

“I came up with two names--Herschel Walker or Bo Jackson,” Shimer said. “Now, here I am driving with Herschel Walker. I must be hallucinating. It was like a dream come true. That really freaked me out.”

Shimer and Walker ought to get along well. Shimer is a former college football player, too. He played running back and wide receiver at Moorhead State in Kentucky and, although he didn’t win the Heisman, as Walker did at Georgia, Shimer said they have a chance to win something together Sunday in the finals.

“We’re a team,” he said. “I’ve still got to do my job, whether or not he’s a superstar or a legend. Herschel has been in the big game before. He’s been there, so in the Olympic game, he knows what it takes.”

So far, Walker has followed his own unique training regimen, including only four hours of sleep, pre-dawn two-mile runs and a diet that has Philbin shaking his head.

“One meal a day--bread, French fries and soup--I don’t know how he does it,” Philbin said. “He doesn’t lift weights, which is against all principles of a guy that size, and low body fat, which also goes against all principles.

“He’s something different. I think Herschel Walker’s genetics are a little different than anyone else.”

Through practice and studying film, Philbin has been working on Walker’s start technique, since one of his primary responsibilities is to push the sled to begin the race. Walker sometimes lifts his head, Philbin said, which creates wind resistance.

“He’s only hit the sled 50 or 60 times,” Philbin said. “Once he hits it 300-400 times, well, he’s going to be at least in the top five in the world. He has all the athletic ability in the world. It’s just a matter of time.”

Walker’s time comes Saturday, and what he does with it may be one of the big stories of the Olympics.

“I didn’t come to sightsee, I didn’t come to meet a lot of people,” Walker said. “I came to compete. I’ll compete whenever and wherever anybody wants me to. I’m ready to do this, in the street or whatever.”