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Following the careers of the swiftest in the sporting world has been the preoccupation of Kenneth Rudeen as a writer, and now as a senior editor, for Sports Illustrated. Man has always been obsessed with speed, and throughout history his quest has gone on in a thousand ways. He has continually pushed for faster speed of communication, for swifter movement of people and goods from the day of the cart to that of the jet airplane. Speed afoot and afloat has always been essential for victory in war. But never has the search for speed been more dramatic than in individual man's struggle to go faster than those before him in sports, in racing cars and in the air.

This is an appreciation of the champions of the postwar era in those pursuits where the ultimate criterion is speed, running, swimming, skiing, auto racing, flying, and speed-record hunting on land and water. The equipment of these champions ranges from the legs, lungs, and cerebellum of a supreme mile runner to the multi-million dollar jet chariot of a record-breaking aviator. Their velocities vary from the runner's glorious 15 mph to the sensational 4,000 mph of the pilot of the X-15.

In addition to their involvement in speed, these champions possess a rare disciplined courage. Auto racer Jim Clark risks his life nearly every week to justify his claim for recognition as the world's finest racing driver. Roger Bannister risked public humiliation and personal agony on a gusty, gray afternoon in Oxford, England, in 1954 when he set out to run the first four-minute mile. In their will to hurtle toward the outer boundaries of human capability, the swiftest experience a joy and perfection beyond the reach of most of us.