One year of Russian and I can read a newspaper with a dictionary in a reasonable amount of time. Writing, speaking, and other active uses of language of course take longer. But understanding and reading should come with less time, no?
the thing is Polish is significantly more irregular than Russian - it is because of phonetic developements of the language - just a little example: Russian: bieda, biedie (poverty in nominative and dative/locative) - Polish: bieda - biedzie (the same); another example: Russian: idti - idiot (to go - he goes) Polish: iść - idzie
yet another one: Russian: vyezti - vyezu (to carry on a vehicle - I carry on a vehicle) Polish - wieźć - wiozę (the same); yet another Russian: igra - igrye (a game nominative- dative/locative) Polish: gra - grze
add another case: Russian: ruka - rukie (a hand nominative - dative/locative) Polish: ręka - ręce
I only give situations where Polish and Russian words are similar - there are plenty of words that are completely different in Polish and in Russian