Jones, Marion

Jones, Marion
▪ 2001

      In September 2000 American track-and-field (athletics) phenomenon Marion Jones became the first woman in history to win five track-and-field medals (three gold and two bronze) at a single Olympic Games. Though quite a remarkable accomplishment, the feat was overshadowed by the fact that Jones, a driven 25-year-old Olympic rookie, had failed to complete her much-publicized mission—to take home from the Games in Sydney, Australia, five gold medals, one in each of her events.

      Jones was born on Oct. 12, 1975, in Los Angeles. Her father left the family when she was very young, but her mother worked hard to help her children succeed. The family moved several times during Jones's adolescence so that the future track star would be able to compete on choice junior-high and high-school teams. By the time she was 12, the strong-willed Jones, nicknamed “hard nails,” was competing internationally; in 1992 she won a place as an alternate on the U.S. Olympic track team but declined the invitation. She also became an accomplished basketball player, winning California's Division I Player of the Year award in 1993.

      Jones attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on a basketball scholarship but also ran track, her first love. After two highly successful years on the Carolina basketball team, Jones quit the squad in 1996 to try for a spot on the U.S. Olympic track team, but she was thwarted by a foot injury. She then returned to basketball for a third and final season, and she received the MVP award of the 1997 Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament. After graduating that spring with a degree in communications and journalism, Jones rededicated herself to track. She was introduced to track coach Trevor Graham by her future husband, champion shot-putter C.J. Hunter.

      In a three-year time span, Jones's rise in track and field had been meteoric. After only a few months of training with Graham, Jones gained the title of “world's fastest woman” in 1997 by winning the 100 m with a time of 10.83 sec at the world championship in Athens. The following year she became the first American woman to be ranked number one in three track-and-field events simultaneously—the 100 m, the 200 m, and the long jump. In 2000 she won Olympic gold medals in the 100 m (10.75 sec), the 200 m (21.84 sec), and the 4 × 400-m relay (3 min 22.62 sec); she claimed bronze medals in the long jump and the 4 × 100-m relay.

Shanda Siler

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▪ American athlete
born October 12, 1975, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
 
  American athlete, who, at the 2000 Olympic Games, became the first woman to win five track-and-field medals at a single Olympics. In 2007, however, she admitted to using banned substances and subsequently returned the medals.

      Jones early displayed talent on the track, and her family moved several times during her adolescence so that she could compete on prominent junior-high and high-school teams. By the time she was 12, Jones had begun competing internationally. She was also an accomplished high-school basketball player, winning California's Division I Player of the Year award in 1993. She attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on a basketball scholarship, and in 1994 she helped the women's basketball team win the national title. Jones decided to sit out the 1995–96 basketball season in order to focus on track and on the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. A series of foot injuries, however, prevented her from trying out for the U.S. Olympic team. She then returned to basketball, and in 1997 she was named the Most Valuable Player of the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament.

      After graduating in 1997, Jones concentrated on track. At the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia, she won gold medals in the 100 metres (10.75 sec) and the 200 metres (21.84 sec) and as a member of the 4 × 400-metre relay team (3 min 22.62 sec); she also claimed bronze medals in the long jump and the 4 × 100-metre relay. At the 2001 world championships, Jones won gold medals in the 200 metres and the 4 × 100-metre relay, and she went undefeated during the 2002 season. She took much of 2003 off because of the birth of her son. She returned to athletics in 2004 but was not up to her previous form. At the Olympic Games in Athens that year, she managed only a fifth-place finish in the long jump.

      Through much of her career, Jones was suspected of using steroids. In 2003 a federal investigation into illegal steroid distribution by the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO) led to allegations by BALCO founder Victor Conte and Jones's ex-husband, C.J. Hunter, that the sprinter used banned substances. Jones, who had never failed a drug test at that time, denied the allegations. In 2006 she tested positive for a banned substance but was later cleared by a follow-up test. The following year, however, she pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators about her drug use and admitted to having taken steroids. In November 2007 track and field's international governing body—the International Association of Athletics Federations—annulled all of Jones's results since September 2000, including her Olympic titles. The International Olympic Committee officially stripped Jones of her five medals from the Sydney Games the following month. In January 2008 she was sentenced to six months in prison for providing false statements to federal investigators about her steroid use and for her involvement in a check-fraud scheme.

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Universalium. 2010.

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