'Alpha-male' Putin battles to preserve macho magic

Moscow: It had all the hallmarks of the hard man stunts that have become Vladimir Putin's trademark. Speed, a dangerous winter sport and excitement amid the campaign for looming Presidential elections.

But when the Russian strongman was pushed down the track in a two man bobsleigh his sled failed to gather enough speed to climb an incline in the training run and instead of whizzing down to the end of the track it slid embarrassingly and somewhat dangerously backwards and downhill towards the start.

"The first time, the bobsleigh with the Prime Minister did not make it to the finish," the government said in a laconic statement. "The second attempt was successful and Vladimir Putin made it to the end of the course."

The February 16 episode ahead of Mr Putin's candidacy in March 4 Presidential elections symbolized how the unusual stunts that Mr Putin had used with great effectiveness for most of his 12-year domination of Russia no longer had the same magic effect as before.

In his eight years as President and four years as Prime Minister, he co-piloted a fighter jet to war-torn Chechnya, stroked a polar bear, tranquilized a tiger, drove a Formula 1 racing car, dived to the bottom of a lake in a mini-submarine and explored Siberia with a naked torso on a horse.

But facing the new challenge of an outburst of protests and fast approaching 60, his hard man antics appear to be wearing thin in an increasingly critical Russia where his every move is scrutinized on the Internet.

"Mr Putin was the demonstrative, charismatic alpha-male," said Olga Mefodyeva, a PR expert at the Center for Political Technologies. "But this image started to get old and an inertia appeared that lost contact with reality."

"It is all about exploiting past achievements but while there are no new creative decisions, things get repeated and recycled," she said.

Mr Putin's outings used to proceed with almost routine smoothness but a taboo appeared to be broken in 2010 when rock musician Yuri Shevchuk challenged him at a charity event about a "growing protest electorate" in the country.

The premier that summer still proceeded to take an extraordinary working holiday in Russia's Far East and Siberia with loyal media in tow, watching whales from an inflatable dinghy on choppy seas and then driving himself across Siberia in a yellow Lada.

One journalist asked him on that trip: "Vladimir Vladimirovich, why such extremes? You understand that this is dangerous?" He quipped back: "Living in general is dangerous."

But the main stunt last summer -- a diving expedition in southern Russia -- backfired horribly after Mr Putin appeared to miraculously "discover" ancient Greek urns. "Treasure!" he told the media after returning ashore in a wet suit.

His spokesman later admitted the urns had been placed there on purpose, sparking a frenzy of mockery among opposition bloggers. "We demand honest amphorae!" said one slogan, playing on a call for honest elections.
On November 20, Mr Putin took to the ring to congratulate the winner of a bloody no-holds-barred fight in Moscow, at a venue packed with die-hard grapple fans whom he would normally see as his natural constituency.

But when he addressed the crowd he was booed and heckled, an unexpected episode broadcast on state television which is now seen as heralding the opposition protests that broke out after December 4 Parliamentary elections.

Gleb Pavlovsky, a former Kremlin adviser who heads the Fund for Effective Policy, said that in the early years of his rule Mr Putin's action man image had contrasted favorably with the era of his erratic predecessor Boris Yeltsin.

"There was a demand for muscles and the demonstration of a strong, active President. And he carefully and intentionally satisfied this."

"Now he carries on doing this because he likes it and it once gave him success. This no longer entertains the people. But he has not paid attention to this," said Gleb Pavlovsky.