By Bryn Palmer, Sydney

The margin of victory was almost embarrassing, the ease and grace with which Marion Jones annihilated the world's top sprinters simply extraordinary.

So imperious was her victory that as she crossed the finishing line in Thursday's 200m Olympic final Jones almost had time to read the front page story in one of the local morning papers outlining the drugs scandal of her husband CJ Hunter.

And the comparison was as pressing it was inevitable.

The last time a woman won the sprint double in such runaway fashion she had two-inch long fingernails and the most famous nickname in women's sport - Florence Griffiths-Joyner, otherwise known as Flo-Jo.

It is the enduring sadness of this sport that both feats, in their different ways, will always be sullied by the scourge of drugs.

Flo-Jo died at the tragically early age of 38 from a heart condition thought to have been brought about by drug abuse.

Jones, for the last 72 hours, has been overwhelmed by a shadow of innuendo and conjecture, as well as reasoned analysis, following the revelation that her husband had tested positive four times in the last year, once with a reading for nandrolone 1000 times more than the permitted limit.

Inevitably, the questions at the post-race conference were not about Jones' running style or her time of 21.84 seconds, which gave her a winning margin of 0.57 seconds - a time which was almost two tenths of a second, or a metre and a half, better than Flo-Jo's winning margin in Seoul.

More pointedly, the questions were directed at whether she was afraid people might think she was not a clean athlete.

"No, I don't have that fear," said Jones.

"Because the people who know me and the people that support me, train with me, coach me, know that I'm a clean athlete."

She insisted also that the scandal surrounding her husband had not diverted her attention from her target of leaving Sydney with five gold medals.

"There was pressure coming to Sydney saying I wanted to go for five gold medals," said Jones.

"To walk into that stadium for the first time blew my mind.

"What has gone on in the last couple of days is not exactly pressure but it could have easily swayed my focus. But it didn't and I'm glad about that.

"I'm here for greater things than just two gold medals. I'm here to prove to myself that it's possible to walk away from Sydney with five gold medals. In a way I am checking them off the list as they come but I am still enjoying them.

"It's not as if this is my fifth Olympic Games. It is my first to let one event in life, as dramatic as it might be, spoil that wouldn't be worth it at all. All the days my mom would travel four or five hours to take me to a track meet. It's all worth it. To let one event ruin it. No way, no way."

She maintained, however, that CJ Hunter - who watched from the stand as Jones left Pauline Davis Thompson from the Bahamas and Susanthika Jayasinghe of Sri Lanka trailing in for silver and bronze respectively - would not be avoiding the arc lights which follow her everywhere.

"CJ has been my main supporter," she said. "Just because something like this happens he's not going to hide in his apartment, that's ridiculous.

"It is very easy to forget about things off the track when you step into the stadium under the lights and with the people, the cameras and everything. It's not very difficult."

The race itself had been billed as the 'Duel of the Divas' - the fastest woman on earth in the shape of Jones against the girl of the Games in Cathy Freeman, who had lit the Olympic cauldron in Stadium Australia and had captivated the nation in each appearance since.

In the end the showdown never materialised.

For even though 110,000 Australians once again turned the Olympic stadium into a screaming, shrieking mass of hysteria in a desperate attempt to sweep Freeman to victory, the 400m champion struggled to live with the sheer foot speed of women's sharpest competitors.

She wasn't even the first Australian home - that honour going to Melinda Gainsford-Taylor, who finished sixth, one place in front of Australia's most famous woman athlete.

But, in truth, there was only ever one winner here once Jones, with the Amazonian physique and the powerful running gait, had lined up, smiled and waved to the crowd and giggled at the public address system which announced her as coming from the Bahamas.

"I just felt awesome," said Jones, who was brought up in north Carolina, though her mother comes from Belize.

"Every athlete dreams of putting their best performance in at the end of the year in the most important race. I did so tonight.

"It's cool to be able to smile at the beginning but when you get down on the blocks it's time to be serious. I needed to stay focused and run a fast turn and I've never run one like this one before."

Jones now turns her attention to the long jump tomorrow and then the sprint relay finals on Saturday in her bid to make history.

"I'm happy that the sprints are done and I can focus on the big challenge ahead, the long jump," she said.

"That's my real test. I hope you didn't doubt me in the sprints. I've got to dig down deep now."

And she insisted that the reality of actually having two gold medals hanging around her neck easily eclipsed any athletics feat about which she had fantasised.

"It is only the second time I have touched an Olympic gold medal and it still means a lot," she said.

"This has been a dream for a lot of years. But it's so much better than the dream. It's so, so much better to have it around your neck."

The words were heartfelt, powerful and passionate. If only the memory of Flo-Jo, eyes sparkling and face radiant with triumph back in Seoul, would go away.