Florence Griffith Joyner Trivia
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49 free Florence Griffith Joyner trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Florence Griffith Joyner trivia for track fans, Olympic history buffs and anyone who remembers the summer of 1988. The quiz covers Flo-Jo's whole story: growing up in the Jordan Downs projects in Watts, winning the Jesse Owens youth games two years running, dropping out of college to work as a bank teller, the boycotted 1980 Olympics, silver in Los Angeles in 1984, and the astonishing 1988 US trials where she ran 10.49 with a wind gauge reading zero on a windy day. It then covers Seoul - the 10.54 final, the 200-metre world records in the semi and final, the relay gold and silver - along with the style that made her famous: the one-legger, the hooded speed-skating suit, the four- and six-inch nails. There are questions on Al Joyner and Bob Kersee, the doping whispers and the tests she passed, the sudden retirement in February 1989, the endorsement money from Japan, the 400-metre comeback attempt, and her death in her sleep at 38 from a seizure caused by a congenital brain abnormality. Roughly a third of the questions are easy; the rest reward real fans. Every answer has been checked against a reference page and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What was the young Florence Griffith wearing around her neck when she was asked to leave a shopping mall?
A pet boa constrictor
A pet boa constrictor, draped like a feather boa, got her thrown out of the mall. The same nerve later sent her to the US Olympic trials in one-legged bodysuits.
Q 02Whose 100 m world record did Griffith Joyner break at the 1988 US Olympic trials?
Evelyn Ashford
Evelyn Ashford's 10.76 had stood for four years. Griffith Joyner ran under it three times in under 24 hours at the trials, then beat Ashford herself to the Olympic title.
Q 03As of 2025, which of Griffith Joyner's 1988 world records still stands?
Both
Both still stand as of 2025. The 100 m is the surprise: before that summer she was rated a 200 m specialist and no contender at the shorter sprint.
Q 04Which sprinter's positive drug test at the 1988 Olympics threw a shadow of suspicion over Griffith Joyner's golds?
Ben Johnson
Ben Johnson lost his 100 m gold within days of winning it. With sprinting under a cloud, her sudden leap in speed drew doping whispers that she always denied.
Q 05Before Griffith Joyner in 1988, who was the only woman to win four track and field medals at one Olympics?
Fanny Blankers-Koen
Fanny Blankers-Koen was a 30-year-old mother of two whom some experts called too old. She won four golds in London in 1948, and forty years on Griffith Joyner's three golds and a silver made her the second.
Q 06In which relay did Griffith Joyner win her only silver at the 1988 Olympics?
4 x 400
The 4 x 400 was never in her plans: drafted in two days before, she ran the anchor leg and could not catch Olha Bryzhina of the Soviet Union, the Olympic 400 m champion.
Q 07What did Griffith Joyner start doing well before the line in the 1988 Olympic 100 m final?
Smiling
Smiling: she was so far clear soon after halfway that the grin came long before the finish. She still won easily in 10.54.
Q 08Which piece of equipment is widely thought to have failed during Griffith Joyner's 10.49 run in 1988?
Wind gauge
The wind gauge read 0.0 for her race, although nearly every other sprint that afternoon, and the jumps runway beside the track, recorded strong tailwinds. The 10.49 was ratified anyway.
Q 09Which sprinter equalled Griffith Joyner's 10.61 in the 2020 Olympic 100 m final and beat it in Eugene in 2021?
Elaine Thompson-Herah
Elaine Thompson-Herah won the Tokyo final in 10.61 at the head of a Jamaican medal sweep, matching Griffith Joyner's 1988 trials-final time. Three weeks later she ran 10.54 in Eugene.
Q 10In which Los Angeles neighbourhood's Jordan Downs public housing complex did Griffith grow up?
Watts
Watts is where her mother raised eleven children on her own in the Jordan Downs project. Florence, the seventh, was racing at weekend track meets by the age of seven.
Q 11What did the young Florence Griffith chase across the Mojave Desert on visits to her father?
Jackrabbits
Jackrabbits were the quarry, and by her own account she eventually caught one. By the age of seven she had moved on to weekend track meets.
Q 12Which youth athletics event did Florence Griffith win two years running, at ages 14 and 15?
The Jesse Owens National Youth Games
The Jesse Owens National Youth Games crowned her at 14 and again at 15. The name came back round in 1988, when she won the Jesse Owens Award as the year's outstanding track and field athlete.
Q 13What job did Griffith take when she had to drop out of college to support her family?
Bank teller
Q 21Which coach did Griffith Joyner leave in July 1988, saying she wanted more personal attention?
Bob Kersee
Bob Kersee had coached her since college, but a week after the 1988 trials she left him over money and a lack of attention. Her husband Al took over, and by October she was a triple Olympic champion.
Q 22What did US coaches blame when they left Griffith off the sprint relay team at the 1984 Olympics?
Long fingernails
Her long fingernails, the coaches feared, would stop her passing the baton safely. Four years later she kept the nails, ran the third leg and won relay gold with the US in Seoul.
Q 23What unusual garment did Griffith Joyner wear at the 1987 World Championships?
Bank teller was the job she took in 1979 after leaving Cal State Northridge to support her family. Her sprint coach found her financial aid, and in 1980 she followed him to UCLA.
Q 14In what subject did Griffith graduate from UCLA in 1983?
Psychology
Psychology was the UCLA degree she finished in 1983, the year she won her second NCAA title. She had moved there in 1980 to follow the sprint coach who got her back into college.
Q 15Why did the sprinters who beat Griffith at the 1980 US trials never race in Moscow?
The US boycotted the Games
The US boycotted the Games over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, so the trials picked a team that never travelled. Griffith, fourth in the 200 m, had missed it by a single place anyway.
Q 16Which teammate beat Griffith to 200 m gold at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics?
Valerie Brisco-Hooks
Valerie Brisco-Hooks won in an Olympic record 21.81. Griffith, disappointed with silver, slipped into semi-retirement and did not train seriously again until 1987.
Q 17In which city did Griffith Joyner take 200 metres silver at the 1987 World Championships?
Rome
Rome came barely four months after she returned to the track in April 1987 from semi-retirement. She still took silver behind East Germany's Silke Gladisch and added gold in the sprint relay.
Q 18Which addition to her training did Griffith Joyner credit for much of her sudden speed in 1988?
Heavy weight training
Heavy weight training was her answer to anyone who asked: squats built the legs for a faster start out of the blocks. Rivals who saw the new muscle suspected something else.
Q 19In which event had Al Joyner, the man Griffith married in 1987, won Olympic gold three years earlier?
Triple jump
Triple jump: Al Joyner won it at the 1984 Los Angeles Games, where Griffith took her 200 m silver. The two had first met at the 1980 trials, and he later became her full-time coach.
Q 20What did Griffith Joyner set out to write a series of after retiring from the track?
Children's books
Children's books were the writing project she talked up when she retired in 1989, and a series followed. She also wrote romance fiction, designed clothes and launched a cosmetics line.
A hooded speed-skating body suit
A hooded speed-skating body suit was only a first taste. At the 1988 US trials she wore a different outfit in every race, among them the one-legged suits she designed herself.
Q 24What did the teenage Griffith persuade her high-school track team to wear with their uniforms?
Tights
She talked her Jordan High team into racing in tights, an early sign of her flair; by graduation in 1978 she held school records in the sprints and the long jump.
Q 25Which rule did US track officials approve shortly after Griffith Joyner retired in 1989?
Random drug testing
Random drug testing, year-round, was voted in the following month, and the timing fed the rumours. Her own explanation was simpler: business offers had left her no time to train.
Q 26Which honour for the top US amateur athlete did Griffith Joyner receive for 1988?
The James E. Sullivan Award
The James E. Sullivan Award, given since 1930 to the top US amateur athlete, went to her for 1988. By the ceremony in March 1989 she had already announced her retirement from racing.
Q 27Which country's advertisers rushed to sign Griffith Joyner after the 1988 Olympics?
Japan
Japan grabbed her first, signing her for adverts within weeks of the Games. She said work like that left her no time to train, and she retired within five months.
Q 28For which NBA team did Griffith Joyner design the uniforms in 1989?
Indiana Pacers
Indiana Pacers players, Reggie Miller among them, wore her design for seven seasons from 1990. The kit became known as the FloJos.
Q 29In which soap opera did Griffith Joyner appear in 1992, playing a photographer named Terry Holloway?
Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, the NBC daytime soap, cast her in a recurring role as an Annie Leibovitz-style celebrity photographer. After years in front of the lens, she was playing the person behind it.
Q 30Which body did Bill Clinton name Griffith Joyner to co-chair in 1993?
The President's Council on Physical Fitness
The President's Council on Physical Fitness had last been chaired by Arnold Schwarzenegger. She shared the job with former congressman Tom McMillen and held it until her death in 1998.