Second gold for Marion Jones

SYDNEY, SEPT. 28. For Marion Jones, athlete extraordinaire, it was not the destination. Merely, stop no. 2. And the gifted American superstar arrived there well in time in the millennium Olympic Games on Wednesday, winning the 200 m gold in patented style.

In completing the second leg of her extraordinary quest for five gold medals, Jones displayed the heart of a great champion as she shut out all the trauma triggered by the revelation that her husband, world champion shot putter C.J. Hunter, had failed four drug tests this year.

The American clocked 21.84 seconds, the best world timing this season, to complete a 100-200 double, the first to do so since her countrywoman, the late Florence Griffith-Joyner in Seoul in 1988. On a day when Konstantinos Kenteris of Greece sprang a major surprise in winning the 200 m gold - his country's first men's athletics gold in 88 years - Jones won as she pleased.

Smiling and relaxed before she settled into her blocks, Jones took a deep breath, a look of stern concentration on her face. Then the beautiful 24-year-old was away fast and powered through the field to forge a two-metre lead by the bend, increasing that to four by the finish.

Pauline Davis-Thompson of the Bahamas finished second and Susanthika Jayasinghe won for Sri Lanka its first Olympic medal in five decades. Having clobbered the field, Jones sank to her knees and watched the race replay on a giant screen in Stadium Australia before setting off on a slow victory jog, the United States flag in one hand and that of Belize - her mother's birthplace - in the other.

Jones has already qualified for the long jump final on Friday and she is hoping for two more golds in the 4x100 and 4x400 m relays.

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