Florence Griffith Joyner

Florence Griffith Joyner

Medal record
Women's athletics
Olympic Games
	1988 Seoul	100 m
	1988 Seoul	200 m
	1988 Seoul	4x100 m relay
	1984 Los Angeles	200 m
	1988 Seoul	4x400 m relay
World Championships
	1987 Rome	4x100 m relay
	1987 Rome	200 m

Florence Griffith-Joyner (born Delorez Florence Griffith), also known as Flo-Jo (December 21, 1959 – September 21, 1998) was an American track and field athlete. She is best known for her media flamboyance and setting World Records in the 100 m and 200 m, which still stand as of 2007. Her career was dogged by allegations of drug use, which was speculated to have caused her premature death. She was the wife of track star Al Joyner and the sister-in-law of Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

Track career

Already fast at an early age, Los Angeles-born, Jordan Downs-raised Delorez Florence Griffith finished fourth in the 200 m at the inaugural World Championship in 1983.

The following year, she gained much more attention, though mostly because of her extremely long and colorful fingernails rather than her silver medal in the Los Angeles Olympics 200 m.

In 1985 Flo Jo won the final of the Grand Prix with an 11.00 seconds.

After these Olympics, Griffith spent less time running and married 1984 Olympic triple jump champion Al Joyner. Returning at the 1987 World Championships, she finished second in the 200 m again.

She stunned the world when — known as a 200 m runner — she ran a new 100 m World Record of 10.49 in the quarter-finals of the US Olympic Trials. Reporters at the event commented that although the wind meter measured 0.0 — indicating no wind — there was visual evidence of considerable wind in the stadium at the time of the race. Every event on that day measured excessive wind speeds and this led many to later suggest that the wind meter in the stadium malfunctioned during the race, but the record is still recognized. Joyner's coach later stated that he believed the 10.49 run had been aided by wind. Flo-Jo never ran faster than 10.61 without excessive wind assistance that season.

Known by the world as "Flo-Jo", Griffith-Joyner was the big favorite for the titles in the sprint events at the 1988 Summer Olympics. In the 100 m, she ran a (wind-assisted) 10.54 in the final, beating her nearest rival Evelyn Ashford by 3 tenths of a second. In the 200 m quarter-final race, she set a new world record of 21.33, and winning in final by .4 seconds. Griffith-Joyner was also a runner in both the 4 x 100 m and 4 x 400 m relay teams. She won a gold medal in the former event, and a silver in the latter, her first international 4 x 400 m relay. Her effort in the 100m was ranked 98th in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Sporting Moments in 2002. She was the 1988 recipient of the James E. Sullivan Award as the top amateur athlete in the United States.

Griffith-Joyner retired from competitive sports shortly after. Among the things she did away from the track was design the basketball uniforms for the Indiana Pacers.

Death

In 1998, Griffith-Joyner died in her sleep at her home in Mission Viejo, California. On October 22, the sheriff-coroner's office (it was an unexpected death) announced the cause of death as: "1) positional asphyxia 2) epileptiform seizure 3) cavernous angioma, left orbital frontal cerebrum".

The cavernous angioma referred to a brain abnormality discovered during the autopsy that made Joyner subject to seizures. It was a congenital defect, having developed at birth. In 1990 she had, according to a family attorney, suffered a grand mal seizure and had been treated for seizures in 1990, 1993 and 1994.

The cause of death in effect said that she had suffocated in her pillow during a severe epileptic seizure.

Controversy

Aside from the controversy of whether her world record should have been held legal in view of the anemometer issues, during her 1988 breakthrough year, Griffith-Joyner was dogged by rumors of drug use. Some suggested that her times could only be the result of using steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs, mainly in that she was rather old for a sprinter (she was 28 years old in 1988), that her physique changed dramatically in 1988, showing marked gains in muscle mass and definition, and her performance improved dramatically over a short period of time. Before the 1988 season, Griffith Joyner's best 100 meter time was 10.96 seconds — not even in the then best 40 marks of all time. In 1988 she improved that by 0.47 seconds, a time that no one has approached since. Similarly, her pre-1988 best at 200 meters was 21.96, a mark not in the top 20 runs on the all-time list. In 1988 she improved that by 0.67 seconds, another time which has not been approached. Griffith-Joyner attributed the change in her physique to new health programs.

Her retirement from competitive track and field after her 1988 Olympic Games triumph further fueled the controversy as mandatory random drug testing was about to be implemented in 1989. Under the less stringent testing schedule during her career, no evidence was found that Griffith-Joyner used performance enhancing drugs. It is now acknowledged that East Germany, for example, conducted a massive program of drug use which also went undetected under the old system of testing. Sprinter Ben Johnson tested positive at the same Olympic Games.

Her death, which autopsies revealed was due to a congenital defect, was a matter of dispute. The authorities stated that there was no indication of any drug or steroid use, past or present, information that her family lauded. The coroner's office was not allowed to test Griffith-Joyner's body for drugs, steroids or growth hormones after her death.

Her death at 38 was seen by some as another case of steroid use resulting in the user dying young.

The effect of questionable, and seemingly unreachable, times posted by Griffith-Joyner and others (see Marita Koch and Jarmila Kratochvilova) in the 1980s on women's sprinting was described in 1995 by then 200 meter world champion Gwen Torrence: "To me they don't exist and women sprinters are suffering as a result of what she did to the times in the 100 and 200".

External links

• Official website
• Florence Griffith-Joyner at World Athletics
• Florence Griffith Joyner's U.S. Olympic Team bio
• Florence Griffith Joyner at Find-A-Grave
• Florence Griffith Joyner is breaking 100m World Record. Video
• Florence Griffith Joyner is breaking 200m World Record. Video