Olympic legend Jackie Joyner-Kersee hit her stride at UCLA, then conquered the world

She is considered among the greatest athletes of all time. But long before Jackie Joyner-Kersee was setting world records and collecting Olympic medals, she was a kid in East St. Louis, Illinois, living in a house that often had no running water and trying to figure out how to practice her long jump when she wasn't allowed to leave the front yard.

After joining a community track program with her brother at the age of 9, she recognized her talent for sport and the stirrings of a lifelong dream. But when her mother was at work, she couldn't attend training. Undaunted, she convinced her sisters to load sand from a nearby park into empty potato chip bags and carry them home to create a makeshift landing pit for her.

"I just thank god I didn't break anything," she said.

For Joyner-Kersee, finding a way to excel with whatever was at hand was already a way of life. She entered her first major long jump competition at 12.

"We were taught to focus on what we had and not to worry about what we didn't have, and that is the same attitude I have in my current life, she told the BBC in a 2025 interview. "I focus on the things I can control and not worry about the things I cannot."

That mental and physical determination would bring Joyner-Kersee rarefied success, carrying her from East St. Louis to UCLA and eventually to the pinnacle of international athletics. Along the way, she became one of the most accomplished athletes in history and helped broaden the sports landscape for women in the United States.

Born March 3, 1962, to teenage parents in East St. Louis, Illinois, Joyner-Kersee was named Jacqueline after the wife of President John F. Kennedy because, in her grandmother's words, "Someday this girl will be the First Lady of something."

What followed was a career full of firsts.

She would become the first woman to score 7,000 points in the heptathlon, breaking that barrier in 1986 and ultimately setting a world record of 7,291 points at the 1988 Seoul Olympics that still stands. She was the first woman to win consecutive Olympic gold medals in the heptathlon, in '88 and at Barcelona in 1992, and the first American woman to win Olympic gold in the long jump, in '88. USA Track & Field lauded her as the only athlete to achieve unprecedented and sustained dominance in both the heptathlon and the long jump simultaneously.

Becoming a Bruin

A gifted multisport athlete, Joyner-Kersee was already competing at an elite level in track and field as a teenager, reaching the finals in the long jump at the 1980 Olympic trials, when she was just 18.

She had already taken notice of UCLA's track-and-field star Evelyn Ashford and Bruin basketball player Ann Meyers-Drysdale in the 1976 Montreal Olympics and hoped that Westwood was a place where her own athletic ambitions could take shape.

"I was thinking, wow, that's a school that supports women's athletics," she recalled in an interview with UCLA Athletics. "UCLA stood for excellence and the very best, and I felt that if I wanted to be one of the best, then I would have to go to UCLA - to be able to wear that jersey, with those four letters across my chest, and represent it to the highest level."

She initially thought she was too short to play college basketball, but UCLA thought otherwise: In 1980, she arrived on a basketball scholarship, with the understanding that she would also compete in track and field - and would dedicate herself to making the 1984 Olympic team.

Getting there would test her in ways she hadn't anticipated - and would help build the champion within. In Westwood, far from her family, Joyner-Kersee struggled with homesickness and cried nearly every night. She was diagnosed with asthma and feared losing her athletic scholarship. Then, during basketball season, her mother died from a rare form of meningitis.

Following the shattering loss, Joyner-Kersee would return to UCLA more dedicated than ever to compete and succeed. She won the NCAA heptathlon title in both 1982 and 1983, establishing herself as one of the nation's premier collegiate athletes , and continued pursuing her ultimate goal: a gold medal in the Olympics.

Silver was not enough

That opportunity came in Los Angeles in 1984, and the experience was foundational to Joyner-Kersee's persistence and eventual dominance.

She recalled the enormity of walking into the Olympic Games' opening ceremony at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum alongside her brother, Al Joyner, who days later would become the first American in 80 years to win Olympic gold in the triple jump.

Her own Games ended with a silver medal in the heptathlon, an extraordinary achievement but not the one she wanted. She recalled feeling that she had been physically - but not mentally - the toughest athlete in the competition.

"That setback in 1984 - I was injured, and as long as I believed something was wrong, I performed that way," she said. "After that, I wanted to be the toughest one out there, and for the next four years, I trained that way because I doubted myself. My coaches and teammates believed in me more than I did. So, when I went into '88, I was ready to give my all."

But first, she returned to UCLA for a fifth and final year. She helped the women's basketball team advance far into the NCAA tournament, finishing her Bruin career with 1,167 points, and was awarded her bachelor's degree in history in 1986. She also married Bob Kersee, her UCLA track coach, who would continue training her as she pursued her Olympic dreams.

A golden record

By the time Joyner-Kersee arrived at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, the silver was well behind her. She won gold in the heptathlon with 7,291 points, a world record that remains unbroken nearly four decades later. And she wasn't finished. She also captured gold in the long jump, soaring 7.40 meters (24 feet, 3 1/2 inches) - the first American woman ever to win the event.

Four years later in Barcelona, she easily won the heptathlon again, becoming the first woman to claim back-to-back Olympic gold medals in that competition. For good measure, she added a bronze in the long jump.

At 34, she returned for one final Olympics, in Atlanta in 1996, and collected another bronze medal in the long jump.

By the end of her Olympic career, Joyner-Kersee had won six medals across four Games - three gold, one silver and two bronze - and was one of the most decorated women in Olympics history. In 1996, she was inducted into the UCLA Athletic Hall of Fame. Three years later, Sports Illustrated for Women named her the greatest female athlete of the 20th century.

A legacy beyond winning

Even at the height of her athletic career, Joyner-Kersee had looked beyond medals and records. In 1988, she established a foundation dedicated to supporting educational, athletic and community programs for underprivileged youth.

"I want them to find happiness in whatever it is that they're doing but understand the discipline it takes, the focus, the commitment - and never giving up," she said recently in an interview from the Jackie Joyner-Kersee Center in East St. Louis.

And 40 years after graduating, she returned to UCLA - the institution she said "helped shape not only my athletic journey but also the woman I have become" - to deliver the keynote address at the 2026 College commencement ceremonies in Pauley Pavilion.

Speaking to a new generation of Bruins, she reflected on the hardships she had faced as a child, a student and an athlete and the teammates, friends and others who nurtured her greatness and helped her persevere.

"You can't do anything alone," she told the graduates, urging them to recognize the people and communities that had helped them reach that moment. And she reminded them that what came next was theirs to shape: "The path that you will take is up to you."

Her final advice echoed the lessons that had carried her from East St. Louis to UCLA and the Olympic podium, and beyond: "Remember to be kind to yourself," she said. "Self-respect, determination and grit … And be the best version of yourself."

In becoming the best version of herself, Joyner-Kersee created a legacy of achievement, perseverance and championship spirit that helped expand what was possible for the women athletes who followed in her wake, said Damion Thomas, a UCLA alumnus, sports historian and curator at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.

"Her success and that of her peers," Thomas said, "helped build the cultural and institutional momentum that led to the explosion of women's professional leagues, increased media coverage and the expansion of collegiate athletics seen today."

Not bad for a journey that began with a young girl's determination to be the best and a few potato chip bags full of sand.