- Born:
- October 12, 1975, Los Angeles, California, U.S. (age 51)
Marion Jones
-
Who is Marion Jones?
Marion Jones (born October 12, 1975) is an American athlete who initially gained fame at the 2000 Olympic Games, where she was the first woman to win five track-and-field medals at a single Olympics.
However, her career was marred by controversy when she admitted in 2007 to using banned substances. As a result, she returned her medals, and the International Olympic Committee officially stripped Jones of her five medals from the Sydney Games. Additionally, she served six months in prison for providing false statements to federal investigators regarding her steroid use and involvement in a check-fraud scheme.
2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
In which sports did Marion Jones compete?
Marion Jones was an accomplished athlete in track and field and basketball.
In track and field, she won five medals at the 2000 Olympic Games, competing in the 100 metres, 200 metres, 4 × 400-metre relay, long jump, and 4 × 100-metre relay. Jones also excelled in basketball, earning California’s Division I Player of the Year award in 1993. She played basketball at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, helping the team win the national title in 1994. In 2010, Jones briefly played in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA).
2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What major events did Marion Jones win medals in?
Marion Jones won five track-and-field medals at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. She won gold medals in the 100 meters (10.75 sec) and the 200 meters (21.84 sec) and as a member of the 4 × 400-meter relay team (3 min 22.62 sec). Jones also claimed bronze medals in the long jump and the 4 × 100-meter relay.
However, in 2007, Jones admitted to using banned substances and consequently had to return the medals. All of Jones’s results from September 2000 forward were annulled, including her Olympic titles. In April 2008, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) ruled that Jones's teammates had to return their medals as well.
2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
How did Marion Jones become famous during the 2000 Sydney Olympics?
Marion Jones achieved fame at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, becoming the first woman to win five track-and-field medals in a single Olympics. She secured gold medals in the 100 metres (10.75 sec) and 200 metres (21.84 sec) races, and as part of the 4 × 400-metre relay team (3 min 22.62 sec). Additionally, she won bronze medals in the long jump and the 4 × 100-metre relay.
However, Jones's reputation was later tarnished when allegations of steroid use surfaced. In 2007, she admitted to using banned substances and lying to federal investigators, leading to the annulment of her results since 2000, including her Olympic titles. She was stripped of her medals and served six months in prison.
3 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
What controversy affected Marion Jones’s career after the Olympics?
After the 2000 Olympics, Marion Jones's career was significantly affected by controversy. In 2007, she admitted to using steroids prior to the Sydney Olympics and pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators about her drug use.
As a result, the International Association of Athletics Federations annulled all of Jones’s results from September 2000 onward, including her Olympic titles. The International Olympic Committee stripped Jones of her five medals from the Sydney Games. In 2008, she was sentenced to six months in prison for making false statements to federal investigators regarding her steroid use and involvement in a check-fraud scheme.
3 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
How has Marion Jones’s life and career been remembered since her retirement?
Marion Jones's career is remembered for her rise and fall from grace. At the 2000 Olympics, she was the first woman to win five track-and-field medals in a single Olympics. However, she later admitted to using banned substances and was stripped of her medals.
In 2007, Jones retired from track and field after admitting to steroid use prior to the 2000 Sydney Olympics and apologized to her friends and family in a letter. The IOC stripped her of her three gold and two bronze medals that she won in 2000 and wiped her from the Olympic record books. In 2008, she was sentenced to six months in prison for lying to the court and deceiving federal investigators. In 2010, Jones attempted to revive her basketball career with the WNBA's Tulsa Shock but was cut in 2011.
3 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Marion Jones (born October 12, 1975, Los Angeles, California, U.S.) is an 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 having used 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. 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 up to 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 from September 2000 on, 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.
In an attempt to revive her long-dormant basketball career, Jones signed with the Tulsa Shock of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) in 2010 but was cut 15 games into the 2011 WNBA season.