A classical nonlinear equation on a complete Riemannian manifold is considered. The existence of solutions connecting any two points is studied, i.e., for T>0 the critical points of the functional with x(0)=x0,x(T)=x1. When the potential V has a subquadratic growth with respect to x, JT admits a minimum critical point for any T>0 (infinitely many critical points if the topology of is not trivial). When V has an at most quadratic growth, i.e., , this property does not hold, but an optimal arrival time T(λ)>0 exists such that, if 0<T<T(λ), any pair of points in can be joined by a critical point of the corresponding functional. For the existence and multiplicity results, variational methods and Ljusternik–Schnirelman theory are used. The optimal value is fulfilled by the harmonic oscillator. These ideas work for other related problems.