Groundbreakers

- [Billie Jean King] Florence Griffith Joyner, also known as Flo-Jo, redefined the sport of track and field.

She not only broke world records and captured Olympic gold medals, she dazzled audiences with her incredible signature sense of style and fashion.

- You know, when I talk about Florence Griffith Joyner, better known as Flo-Jo, before she was my sister-in-law, she was my teammate at UCLA.

Florence transcended our sport and took track and field off the sports page to the front page.

It brought in more people wanting to know more about her as an individual, but then also about the sport of track and field.

- [Billie Jean] Flo-Jo was a celebrated 200 meter runner, winning silver at the 1984 Olympics and the 1987 World Championship.

But it was the 1988 Olympic trials in Indianapolis where she became the fastest woman on the planet by breaking the world record for the 100 meters.

But her world record was overshadowed by some controversy.

In the first heat of the quarterfinals, Flo-Jo stunned the world to clock 10.49 seconds, an unbelievable time... but there were possibly some extenuating circumstances.

It was a very windy day in Indianapolis.

The wind gauge for Flo-Jo's race read an unusual 0.0 meters per second.

While across the same track, the wind gauge was clocking 4.3 meters per second.

Omega, the official time recorders of the meet, maintained that the wind reading was correct, and the Athletic Congress, the sport's national governing body, accepted the results.

While many statisticians note the run was probably strongly wind-assisted, Flo-Jo's world record still stands.

Flo-Jo's dominance in the sport continued at the 1988 Olympics, where she won three gold medals and broke another world record, this time in the 200-meter race.

Long before athletes were known for their fashion, Flo-Jo brought her big personality and bold fashion sense into her sport.

She became known for her stylish manicures and one-of-a-kind running outfits.

The world watched to not only see her run like the wind, but to see what she would be wearing while doing it.

Flo-Jo told reporters her mantra was, "Dress good to look good, look good to feel good, and feel good to run fast."

Audiences and fans loved everything Flo-Jo brought to the sport and she was catapulted into a level of success usually reserved for A-list musicians and actors.

In 1995, she was inducted into the Track and Field Hall of Fame, and used her fashion experience to design two popular fashion lines in Japan, and the uniforms of the NBA's Pacers.

(somber music) Tragically, her life was cut short at the age of 38, when Florence Griffith Joyner died unexpectedly from an epileptic seizure.

- It's hard sometimes to just talk about when you lose a great human being.

And with my brother and with my niece, you know, that it was a, a tremendous loss to our family.

But her legacy, it continues on.

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