Jones to seek three golds at world championships

Triple Olympic gold medallist Marion Jones will limit herself to two sprint events and a possible relay at next month's world championships in Canada, her coach said on Tuesday.

"She's going to successfully defend her 100-metres title and try to win the 200 (metres) for the first time," Trevor Graham said in an interview at the North Carolina State University track where Jones trains.

"After that we're going to try to see if she can get on the 4x100 (metre relay). If not, we'll just get ready for the remainder of the season."

Jones won five Olympic medals at Sydney last year, claiming gold in the 100 and 200 metres and 4x400-metre relays and bronze in the long jump and 4x100-metre relay.

But she is not long jumping this year and will run only one relay at the August 3-12 world championships in Edmonton, Graham said.

However her selection to the American relay team was not automatic, a U.S. athletics official said Tuesday.

"She is someone you would want to run on your relay team, but there are some concerns that I have to talk about with my staff," J.J. Clark, the U.S. women's world championships coach, said in a separate interview from his office in Gainesville, Florida.

One concern is that Jones was not at the Americans' relay camp in Monte Carlo earlier this month, he said.

Clark said he had only learned on Monday that Jones was interested in running the 4x100-metre relay and that he was still working on a relay pool.

He hoped to have a decision by Wednesday.

Under U.S. rules anyone who competed in the national championships is eligible for the relay team.

Jones won the 200 metres at the American championships last month, but did not compete in the 100 metres, choosing to accept a bye to Edmonton in the event as the defending world champion.

Jones had talked about running the 4x400-metre relay at the championships but that idea had been abandoned, Graham said.

"After (training mate and U.S. 400-metre champion) LaTasha (Colander-Richardson) got injured and Michele Collins left camp, it just does not make any sense to put all that pressure on Marion to run the 4x400," he said.

Jones sparked the Americans to gold in the 4x400 at Sydney, running the third leg on a team that included Jearl Miles-Clark, Monique Hennagan and Colander-Richardson.

Miles-Clark has also been injured this year and how well she runs in a competition this weekend will determine whether she will be a member of the American 4x400-metre relay pool, Clark, her husband, said.