For Jackie Joyner-Kersee, the hardest thing about winning a second straight Olympic gold medal in the heptathlon seemed to be celebrating it.
When she crossed the finish line in the final event, the 800 meters, Joyner-Kersee made a weak attempt to put her hands over her head Sunday evening at Olympic Stadium.
It took her nearly 10 more minutes to find the strength for a victory lap.
She started walking around with a small U.S. flag near the finish line. That might have been as far as Joyner-Kersee got without some urging from Gail Devers, who won the 100 meters Saturday.
Devers all but pushed Joyner-Kersee around the first 50 meters of the 400-meter track. From there she walked and jogged, trading the hand-sized flag for a flagpole version of Old Glory she was barely able to hold up.
Joyner-Kersee`s newest glory was a third straight Olympic medal-second straight gold-in the heptathlon, the first time that has been done in Olympic multi-event track competition by a man or a woman.
”After 1984, I told her, you`ve got to be like Rafer,” said Bob Kersee, her husband and coach. ”After 1988, I said now you`ve got to be like Bob Mathias.”
Rafer Johnson went from a decathlon silver medal in 1956 to a gold in 1960. Mathias became the first man to win consecutive decathlon golds-in 1948 and 1952.
Only Joyner-Kersee has won consecutive golds in a women`s multi-event competition, which has been held in the Olympics since 1964. It started as the pentathlon, with hurdles, high jump, shot put, long jump and 200 meters. In 1984, the javelin and 800 meters were added to make it a heptathlon.
On Thursday, she begins the quest to win a second straight long-jump gold.
”This win may have been her greatest,” said Bruce Jenner, 1976 Olympic decathlon champion.
Joyner-Kersee had 7,044 points, the sixth-best score in heptathlon history, a total only she has bettered. Irina Belova of Russia was second with 6,845, nearly 300 points more than her previous personal best. World champion Sabine Braun of Germany was third with 6,649.
For the first time in six years, Joyner-Kersee faced a presumably serious heptathlon rival in Braun. Until the Olympics, Braun had the year`s best score in the event. She also had won the 1991 world championships when Joyner-Kersee pulled a hamstring in the 200 meters and had to drop out.
The competition between the two included some mind games, with the German and her coaches trying to get on Joyner-Kersee`s nerves.
”You try not to concentrate on those things because it`s a negative,”
Joyner-Kersee said. ”I`m the type that would greet everyone or have nice things to say about everyone. Some probably need that sort of stuff to boost their performance.”
That stuff ended after Sunday`s first event, the long jump, which is also where Joyner-Kersee all but clinched the gold.
Braun had been only 15 points behind after three events and began the second day within reach-127 behind.
As Joyner-Kersee walked toward the runway for her second jump, Braun crossed in front of her. Neither gave way, leading to a slight bump.
Seconds later, Joyner-Kersee had her best jump of the day-23 feet 3 1/2 inches. That led to a 350-point gain over Braun, who jumped only 19-9 and briefly dropped to fourth before winding up with the bronze.
Going into the final event, Joyner-Kersee needed only stay within 23 seconds of the faster Belova to clinch the gold. But she also wanted to reach 7,000 points, which meant running the 800 in 2 minutes 14.87 seconds or better.
With her eyes in downcast determination, Joyner-Kersee did the two laps of the track in 2:11.78.
”That was nothing but sheer will,” Bob Kersee said.
So was the victory lap. It took nearly 10 minutes. Joyner-Kersee stopped, walked, jogged and smiled. The last was easy.
