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Career change Jones eyes unfinished business, including basketball
LONDON (AP) -- Five is out for Marion Jones, who is looking at just four events in this year's world track championships. There's also an outside chance that the Olympic sprint champion might play basketball again. Jones, winner of three gold medals at the Sydney Games as she tried unsuccessfully for an unprecedented five titles, hinted Tuesday that she would skip the 400-meter relay this summer in Edmonton, Alberta. "I can pretty much guarantee you I'll be in the 200 simply because I have yet to win a world championship in the 200 meters," she said. "I've yet to win a world championship in the long jump, so pretty much count me in on that one. "The 100 is pretty much my forte, so I'll be in that. I guess it depends on that relay, and I've kind of fallen in love with that 4x400-meter race." Recognizing she might have said too much, Jones laughed at herself. "I guess maybe I just gave it all away right now," she said. Four months after winning five Olympic medals, Jones sounded as if she's yet to win a thing, reciting a long list of unfinished business. She said she might even return to the basketball court, where she starred for North Carolina. "If I go out there this year and accomplish all those things I was talking about, well then maybe," Jones said. Jones, 25, clicked off a few outdoor medals she hasn't won: 200-meter world championship, long jump in the Olympics and world championships, 400 relay Olympic title. She also holds neither the 100 nor 200 world records, seemingly untouchable marks set by the late Florence Griffith Joyner. "I'm not even close to perfecting my technique in the sprints -- and obviously in my long jump. So I have a lot to improve on," she said. "That's really exciting, the fact I can go to Sydney and win five medals and still not yet be at the top of my game. You might have some people who would argue with that, but that's my opinion." Jones, like double Olympic champion Maurice Greene -- who was also in London for Tuesday's World Sports Awards -- will again skip the indoor season. Her outdoor season begins in April in California. She said one day she might train for indoor meets, eyeing the indoor 60-meter record of Russian Irina Privalova (6.92 seconds). "It's difficult for me to start sprinting in December," she said. "Maybe in the next couple of years I might dedicate time to running some fast 60s to break that world record I think is long overdue." "There are lots of things out there that still motivate me."
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