Florence Griffith Joyner's Quotes

A muscle is like a car. If you want it to run well early in the morning, you have to warm it up.

I like being unconventional.

I believe in the impossible because no one else does.

Conventional is not for me. I like things that are uniquely Flo. I like being different.

I couldn't wait until I grew up. I used to look at my mom's stockings and put them on with her high heels and mess with my hair.

I don't do drugs. I never have taken any drugs. I don't believe in them.

I used to be teased for the way I wore my hair at school. I used to do things like wear a different-colored sock on each leg.

I've always overworked in the weight room. I love working with weights. I knew they'd give me the strength I needed.

If you want to run as fast as the men, you've got to train like the men.

The main reason I wanted to be successful was to get out of the ghetto. My parents helped direct my path.

I don't always have the best eating habits. I like butter and ice cream. There are days when I should work out and I don't. But it's never too late to change old habits.

I have been running since I was 7. I was trying to restructure the way my body was made instead of trying to master the way I ran. I would get so frustrated with my starts in practices that I would just cry. When I ran, I wouldn't even try to get out of the blocks, I would just run.

I love working with kids, talking with them and listening to them. I always encourage kids to reach beyond their dreams. Don't try to be like me. Be better than me.

I was always doing something physical. My brothers and I used to have handstand contests. We'd walk around the projects on our hands and see who could get the farthest. I was always playing football with them, basketball or racing in the street.

People want to think that staying in shape costs a lot of money. They couldn't be more wrong. It doesn't cost anything to walk. And it's probably a lot cheaper to go to the corner store and buy vegetables than take a family out for fast food.

That's what I'd like to do on the President's Council. Make sports and athletics available to every youth in America, not just one day a week like it was for me, but every day.

To do justice to a lifelong dream of being a writer, I must give it the intense concentration and focus I gave to track. To do both with excellence is not possible. It is with a sense of sadness and joyous anticipation that I leave track and move on.