Joyner-Kersee Sets Record, Then Tumbles

Jackie Joyner-Kersee set an American record in the long jump Saturday with a leap of 23 feet 4 3/4 inches in the USA-Mobil Indoor Championships at Atlanta. She then fell over the final hurdle in the 60-meter hurdles, a race she was leading, and limped off the track and to a hospital for X-rays of her left ankle. There was no report on her condition.

Gwen Torrence set an American record with a time of 22.74 seconds in winning the 200, then won the 60-meter dash for the first women’s sprint double in the national championships in 25 years.

Auto Racing

Joe Nemechek led 147 of the 250 laps, including the final 60, in winning the Hardee’s Frisco 250 Grand National race at Richmond, Va.

Nemechek earned $17,021 and averaged 91.253 m.p.h. in his Chevrolet over the three-quarter-mile track and was a 1.17-second winner over Kenny Wallace’s Ford.

Rachelle Splatt of Australia became the first woman in drag racing to reach 300 m.p.h. during qualifying, and top fuel dragster Kenny Bernstein failed to qualify for the first time in nearly 11 years at the NHRA Slick 50 Nationals in Baytown, Tex.

Splatt had a run of 4.907 seconds at 300.00 m.p.h. in a top fuel dragster.

Football

Former Houston assistant Steve Staggs has accused former Cougar coach John Jenkins of using under-inflated footballs to try to increase school passing statistics and says the program provided a player improper housing assistance last summer.

The accusations are in documents related to his lawsuit against the school that charges Staggs, 34, was fired because he went public with allegations of improprieties in the football program.

Gymnastics

Vitaly Scherbo of Belarus won the men’s all-around title and fellow Olympian Dominique Dawes of the United States won the women’s division in the McDonald’s American Cup gymnastics meet at Orlando, Fla.

Scherbo, with 57.075 points, edged the United States’ John Roethlisberger with 56.425. He was followed by Germany’s Oliver Walther (55.450), UCLA’s Chainey Umphrey (55.425), Ukraine’s Rustam Sharipov (55.225), China’s Wang Dong (54.600), Great Britain’s Marvin Campbell (53.675) and Hungary’s Zoltan Supola (53.000).

Dawes (39.387) was followed by Greece’s Vassou Tsavdaridou (38.429), Belarus’ Elena Piskun (38.393), France’s Elodie Lussac (38.186), Ukraine’s Lilia Podkopayeva (37.599), Hungary’s Andrea Molnar (37.143), the United States’ Larissa Fontaine (37.142) and China’s Qiao Ya (36.755).

Miscellany

Three substitutes--one more than in the past--will be allowed at soccer games starting with this summer’s World Cup. The rule change will allow coaches to bring in two field replacements and a designated replacement goalkeeper during a match.

The 58 teams went only three-quarters of a mile on the first day of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska. Race officials last month shortened the first day racing because a lack of snow had left Anchorage-area trails in poor condition.

The 1,100-mile race to Nome will get going today at the restart in Willow, about 70 miles north of Anchorage.

Tennis

Steffi Graf advanced to the final of the $400,000 Virginia Slims of Florida with a 7-5, 6-4, victory over Helena Sukova at Delray Beach.

Graf, the world’s No. 1 player, has not lost in 21 matches this year, winning all 42 sets.

She will play the world’s second-ranked player, Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, who beat Chanda Rubin of Lafayette, La., 6-2, 6-3.

Winter Sports

Cary Mullen of Canada scored his first World Cup ski victory, winning the America’s Downhill at Aspen, Colo.

Mullen was timed in 1 minute 38.21 seconds, edging Norwegian Atle Skaardal in 1:38.26. Olympic gold medal winner Tommy Moe managed to get into the top 20 with a time of 1:39.50.

At Lahti, Finland, Vladimir Smirnov of Kazakhstan added the World Cup cross-country skiing title to the 50-kilometer championship he won at the Olympics, clinching the season title by winning a 15-kilometer freestyle event by 22.8 seconds over Nor way’s Bjorn Dahlie, a double gold-medal winner at Lillehammer.

Also at Lahti, Olympic long hill champion Jens Weissflog of Germany won the normal hill ski jumping meet, soaring 94 meters in the second round.