Flo Jo Not Running Yet, but Many Others Are

Past and present UCLA and USC track and field athletes will be featured today, but not Flo Jo.

Florence Griffith Joyner, a former Bruin who has not competed since winning three gold medals and a silver in the 1988 Summer Olympics, considered beginning her comeback today in the Steve Scott Invitational at UC Irvine.

Instead, her husband, Al Joyner, said that she will postpone her season debut for at least one week. Hoping to compete in this summer’s Olympics in Atlanta in the 400 meters, she needs a qualifying time before the June 14-23 U.S. trials.

Meantime, Al Joyner also is in search of a qualifying mark in his effort to return to the Olympics for the first time since he won the gold medal in the triple jump in 1984. He will compete today in Irvine in the triple jump and long jump.

In one of the nation’s longest track and field rivalries, UCLA and USC will meet in a dual meet today in Westwood’s Drake Stadium for the 63rd consecutive year. USC’s men lead the series, 38-24, but UCLA has won the last 17. UCLA’s women have won three in a row in a series that began in 1984.

Neither streak is expected to be broken today. UCLA’s men are led by sprinter Ato Boldon of Trinidad, who finished third in the 100 meters in last summer’s world championships. Against the Trojans, he will run the 100, 200 and 400-meter relay. Brigham Young also will send men’s and women’s teams to participate in triangular scoring.

Officials have added five open events for former UCLA and USC athletes trying to make the Olympic team. Two of the races, the Kevin Williams Memorial 110-meter hurdles and the Benny Brown Memorial 400 meters, honor ex-athletes from the schools who died in recent accidents. Three-time world champion Greg Foster will compete in the former, 1992 Olympic champion Quincy Watts in the latter.

In another national meet of interest today, Carl Lewis will open his long jump campaign at the Mizuno Houston Invitational.

Internationally, Americans Michael Johnson and Jeff Williams, the gold and bronze medalists in the 200 in the world championships, meet in that event in the first meet of this season’s IAAF Grand Prix circuit in Rio de Janeiro.