MARION JONES has conducted communications with the outside world through a private corps of lawyers and publicists in recent months but last night she spoke directly to a rapt audience of 75,000 people in the Olympic stadium, and billions of television viewers besides, in the way she knows best. Her message from the sandpit — her sole individual effort after failing to qualify in the 100 metres and 200 metres — was one of relaxed defiance as she qualified for the long jump final tomorrow with a second attempt of 6.70 metres.
Since arriving in Athens, the 28-year-old dogged by the doping scandal troubling US athletics has kept such a low profile as to be invisible. The only words before the eagerly anticipated follow-up to her five-medal haul four years ago came through Rich Nichols, her lawyer. “She is a fighter, a working mom and a champion,” he said.
Despite her record-breaking medal collection from Sydney, the last of those has still to be proved in many minds. The back-door entrance to these Games was in dramatic contrast to her bombastic incursion of Sydney at a press conference alongside Michael Johnson and Maurice Greene, where she stated an intention to win five golds.
She managed only three, plus two bronzes, but it was still history-making and a new darling of athletics was born, for a short time at least. In 2004, Jones is a marked woman. She said she left Sydney feeling “like a fugitive” after it emerged that C. J. Hunter, her then husband and international shot-putter, had tested positive four times for nandrolone.
She has been on the run from the doubters ever since as the storm clouds of controversy gathered around her with a grand jury investigation into “doping violations”. Among those charged with receiving steroids from Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (Balco) is Tim Montgomery, the 100 metres world record-holder and the father of Jones’s 14-month-old son.
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While Jones has never been charged, despite reported testimony from Hunter — now her ex-husband — that he injected her with banned substances during and after Sydney, the associated slurs refuse to abate. She has never failed a drugs test although she received a four-year ban in 1993 — overturned after a year — for missing one.
At the US Olympic trials last month, a hounded Jones finished fifth in the 100 metres and pulled out of the 200 metres but qualified for the long jump, historically her weakest event, with a leap of 7.11 metres, her best for six years. Although a potential medal-winner through sheer speed down the ramp, Jones faces fierce competition from Tatyana Lebedeva, the world indoor champion, and Carolina Klüft, of Sweden, who both qualified with their first jumps of 6.95 metres and 6.73 metres respectively.
Jade Johnson, of Britain, the European and Commonwealth silver medal-winner, qualified with a heart-fluttering last attempt of 6.71 metres. After checking spikemarks on the board, the judges ruled her toe just inside the line.
Even before the final, Jones will again court controversy if she is selected for the 4 x 400 metres relay heats today despite misgivings in the US team. Michael Johnson, who could be stripped of his gold medal from Atlanta after Jerome Young, his running colleague, tested positive, has said she should not be considered.