Caitlyn Marie Jenner (born William Bruce Jenner; October 28, 1949) is an American television personality and retired Olympic gold medal–winning decathlete.
Jenner played college football for the Graceland Yellowjackets before incurring a knee injury that required surgery. Convinced by Olympic decathlete Jack Parker's coach, L. D. Weldon, to try the decathlon, Jenner won the men's decathlon event at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal,[3][4] setting a third successive world record and gaining fame as "an all-American hero".[5] Given the unofficial title of "world's greatest athlete",[6] Jenner established a career in television, film, writing, auto racing, business, and as a Playgirl cover model.[7]
Jenner has six children with three successive wives—Chrystie Crownover, Linda Thompson, and Kris Jenner—and has since 2007 appeared on the reality television series Keeping Up with the Kardashians with Kris, their daughters Kendall and Kylie Jenner, and Kris's other children Kourtney, Kim, Khloé, and Rob Kardashian. Assigned male at birth, Caitlyn Jenner publicly came out as a trans woman in April 2015. Her new name was publicly announced in July of that year, with her name and gender being legally changed the following September.[8] From 2015 to 2016, Jenner starred in the reality television series I Am Cait, which focused on her gender transition. In January 2017, she underwent sex reassignment surgery.[9] Jenner has been called the most famous transgender woman in the world
Early life
Caitlyn Marie Jenner was born William Bruce Jenner on October 28, 1949, in Mount Kisco, New York.[12] She was known as Bruce Jenner until June 2015. Her parents are Esther Ruth (née McGuire) and William Hugh Jenner, who was an arborist.[13][14] She is of English, Scottish, Irish, Dutch, and Welsh descent.[15] Her younger brother, Burt, was killed in a car accident in Canton, Connecticut on November 30, 1976, shortly after Jenner's success at the Olympic Games.[16][17] As a young child, Jenner was diagnosed with dyslexia.[18]
Jenner attended Sleepy Hollow High School in Sleepy Hollow, New York, for her freshman and sophomore years[19][20] and Newtown High School in Newtown, Connecticut, for her junior and senior years, graduating in 1968.[21] Jenner earned a football scholarship and attended Graceland College (now Graceland University) in Lamoni, Iowa, but was forced to stop playing football because of a knee injury.[22] Recognizing Jenner's potential, Graceland track coach L. D. Weldon encouraged Jenner to switch to the decathlon.[23] Jenner debuted as a decathlete in 1970 in the Drake Relays decathlon in Des Moines, Iowa, finishing in fifth place.[24] Jenner graduated from Graceland College in 1973 with a degree in physical education.[25]
Decathlon career
Early career
At the 1972 U.S. Olympic trials in Eugene, Oregon, Jenner was in fifth place in the men's decathlon, behind Steve Gough and Andrew Pettes, with only the last event remaining. Needing to make up a 19-second gap on Gough in the men's 1500 metres, Jenner qualified for the Olympic team by running a fast final lap, finishing 22 seconds ahead of the other runners. This prompted the Eugene Register-Guard to ask: "Who's Jenner?"[26][27] Following the Olympic Trials, Jenner finished in tenth place in the decathlon at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich.[28] By watching Soviet Mykola Avilov win the event, Jenner was inspired to start an intense training regimen. "For the first time, I knew what I wanted out of life and that was it, and this guy has it. I literally started training that night at midnight, running through the streets of Munich, Germany, training for the Games. I trained that day on through the 1976 Games, 6–8 hours a day, every day, 365 days a year."[29]
After graduating from Graceland, Jenner married girlfriend Chrystie Crownover and moved to San Jose, California. Crownover provided most of the family income by working as a flight attendant for United Airlines.[30] Jenner trained during the day and sold insurance at night, earning US$9,000 a year.[31][32] In the era before professional American athletes were allowed to compete in Olympic sports, this kind of training was unheard of. On the other hand, Soviet athletes were state-sponsored, which gave them a certain advantage over amateur American athletes.[33][34][34] During this period, Jenner trained at the San Jose City College (SJCC) and San Jose State University (SJSU) tracks.[35][36] San Jose athletics centered on SJCC coach Bert Bonanno; at that time, the city was a hotbed for training and was called the "Track Capital of the World".[32] Many other aspiring Olympic athletes also trained at San Jose; the list included Millard Hampton, Andre Phillips, John Powell, Mac Wilkins, and Al Feuerbach.[35][37] Jenner's most successful events were the skill events of the second day: hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin and 1500 meters.[5][38]
Olympic success
Jenner was the American champion in the men's decathlon event in 1974, and was featured on the cover of Track & Field News magazine's August 1974 issue.[39][40] While on tour in 1975, Jenner won the French national championship,[41] and a gold medal at the 1975 Pan American Games, earning the tournament record with 8,045 points.[25] This was followed by new world records of 8,524 points at the U.S.A./U.S.S.R./Poland triangular meet in Eugene, Oregon on August 9–10, 1975, breaking Avilov's record,[42] and 8,538 points at the 1976 Olympic trials, also in Eugene.[27][43] The record in Eugene was a hybrid score because a timing system failure and wind aided marks. Still, Jenner was proud of "A nice little workout, huh?"
"We got what we wanted. We scared the hell out of everybody in the world only a month away from the Games."[44]
Of the 13 decathlons Jenner competed in between 1973 and 1976, the only loss was at the 1975 AAU National Championships, when a "no height" in the pole vault marred the score.[25]
At the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal, Jenner achieved five personal bests on the first day of the men's decathlon – a "home run" – despite being in second place behind Guido Kratschmer of West Germany. Jenner was confident: "The second day has all my good events. If everything works out all right, we should be ahead after it's all over." Following a rainstorm on the second day, Jenner watched teammate Fred Dixon get injured in the 110 meter hurdles,[45] so took a cautious approach to the hurdles and discus, then had personal bests in the pole vault, when Jenner took the lead, and javelin.[46] By that point, victory was virtually assured, but it remained to be seen by how much Jenner would improve the record. In the final event—the 1500 meters, which was seen live on national television—Jenner looked content to finish the long competition. Jenner sprinted the last lap, making up a 50-meter deficit and nearly catching the event favorite, Soviet Leonid Litvinenko, who was already well out of contention for the gold medal, but whose personal best had been eight seconds better than Jenner's personal best before the race. Jenner set a new personal best time and won the gold medal with a world-record score of 8,618 points
Impact
After the event, Jenner took an American flag from a spectator and carried it during the victory lap, starting a tradition that is now common among winning athletes.[50][51] Abandoning vaulting poles in the stadium, with no intention of ever competing again, Jenner stated that: "In 1972, I made the decision that I would go four years and totally dedicate myself to what I was doing, and then I would move on after it was over with. I went into that competition knowing that would be the last time I would ever do this."[29] Jenner explained, "It hurts every day when you practice hard. Plus, when this decathlon is over, I got the rest of my life to recuperate. Who cares how bad it hurts?"[5]
As a result of winning the Olympic decathlon, Jenner became a national hero and received the James E. Sullivan Award as the top amateur athlete in the United States and was also named the Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year in 1976.[4][22]
Jenner's 1976 world and Olympic record was broken by four points by Daley Thompson at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow; Thompson's victory was perhaps tainted by the U.S.-led boycott of the Moscow Olympics in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, though the top American at the time, Bobby Coffman, was not expected to push Thompson or challenge Jenner's record. In 1985, Jenner's Olympic decathlon score was reevaluated against the IAAF's updated decathlon scoring table and was reported as 8,634 for comparative purposes. This converted mark stood as the American record until 1991, when it was surpassed by eventual gold medalist, and world record holder, Dan O'Brien of Dan & Dave fame.[52] As of 2018, Jenner was ranked twenty-sixth on the world all-time list and ninth on the American all-time list.[53]
Jenner was inducted into the United States National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1980, the Olympic Hall of Fame in 1986, the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame and the Connecticut Sports Hall of Fame in 1994, and the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame in 2010.[54] For almost 20 years, San Jose City College hosted an annual Bruce Jenner Invitational competition
Jenner played college football for the Graceland Yellowjackets before incurring a knee injury that required surgery. Convinced by Olympic decathlete Jack Parker's coach, L. D. Weldon, to try the decathlon, Jenner won the men's decathlon event at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal,[3][4] setting a third successive world record and gaining fame as "an all-American hero".[5] Given the unofficial title of "world's greatest athlete",[6] Jenner established a career in television, film, writing, auto racing, business, and as a Playgirl cover model.[7]
Jenner has six children with three successive wives—Chrystie Crownover, Linda Thompson, and Kris Jenner—and has since 2007 appeared on the reality television series Keeping Up with the Kardashians with Kris, their daughters Kendall and Kylie Jenner, and Kris's other children Kourtney, Kim, Khloé, and Rob Kardashian. Assigned male at birth, Caitlyn Jenner publicly came out as a trans woman in April 2015. Her new name was publicly announced in July of that year, with her name and gender being legally changed the following September.[8] From 2015 to 2016, Jenner starred in the reality television series I Am Cait, which focused on her gender transition. In January 2017, she underwent sex reassignment surgery.[9] Jenner has been called the most famous transgender woman in the world
Early life
Caitlyn Marie Jenner was born William Bruce Jenner on October 28, 1949, in Mount Kisco, New York.[12] She was known as Bruce Jenner until June 2015. Her parents are Esther Ruth (née McGuire) and William Hugh Jenner, who was an arborist.[13][14] She is of English, Scottish, Irish, Dutch, and Welsh descent.[15] Her younger brother, Burt, was killed in a car accident in Canton, Connecticut on November 30, 1976, shortly after Jenner's success at the Olympic Games.[16][17] As a young child, Jenner was diagnosed with dyslexia.[18]
Jenner attended Sleepy Hollow High School in Sleepy Hollow, New York, for her freshman and sophomore years[19][20] and Newtown High School in Newtown, Connecticut, for her junior and senior years, graduating in 1968.[21] Jenner earned a football scholarship and attended Graceland College (now Graceland University) in Lamoni, Iowa, but was forced to stop playing football because of a knee injury.[22] Recognizing Jenner's potential, Graceland track coach L. D. Weldon encouraged Jenner to switch to the decathlon.[23] Jenner debuted as a decathlete in 1970 in the Drake Relays decathlon in Des Moines, Iowa, finishing in fifth place.[24] Jenner graduated from Graceland College in 1973 with a degree in physical education.[25]
Decathlon career
Early career
At the 1972 U.S. Olympic trials in Eugene, Oregon, Jenner was in fifth place in the men's decathlon, behind Steve Gough and Andrew Pettes, with only the last event remaining. Needing to make up a 19-second gap on Gough in the men's 1500 metres, Jenner qualified for the Olympic team by running a fast final lap, finishing 22 seconds ahead of the other runners. This prompted the Eugene Register-Guard to ask: "Who's Jenner?"[26][27] Following the Olympic Trials, Jenner finished in tenth place in the decathlon at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich.[28] By watching Soviet Mykola Avilov win the event, Jenner was inspired to start an intense training regimen. "For the first time, I knew what I wanted out of life and that was it, and this guy has it. I literally started training that night at midnight, running through the streets of Munich, Germany, training for the Games. I trained that day on through the 1976 Games, 6–8 hours a day, every day, 365 days a year."[29]
After graduating from Graceland, Jenner married girlfriend Chrystie Crownover and moved to San Jose, California. Crownover provided most of the family income by working as a flight attendant for United Airlines.[30] Jenner trained during the day and sold insurance at night, earning US$9,000 a year.[31][32] In the era before professional American athletes were allowed to compete in Olympic sports, this kind of training was unheard of. On the other hand, Soviet athletes were state-sponsored, which gave them a certain advantage over amateur American athletes.[33][34][34] During this period, Jenner trained at the San Jose City College (SJCC) and San Jose State University (SJSU) tracks.[35][36] San Jose athletics centered on SJCC coach Bert Bonanno; at that time, the city was a hotbed for training and was called the "Track Capital of the World".[32] Many other aspiring Olympic athletes also trained at San Jose; the list included Millard Hampton, Andre Phillips, John Powell, Mac Wilkins, and Al Feuerbach.[35][37] Jenner's most successful events were the skill events of the second day: hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin and 1500 meters.[5][38]
Olympic success
Jenner was the American champion in the men's decathlon event in 1974, and was featured on the cover of Track & Field News magazine's August 1974 issue.[39][40] While on tour in 1975, Jenner won the French national championship,[41] and a gold medal at the 1975 Pan American Games, earning the tournament record with 8,045 points.[25] This was followed by new world records of 8,524 points at the U.S.A./U.S.S.R./Poland triangular meet in Eugene, Oregon on August 9–10, 1975, breaking Avilov's record,[42] and 8,538 points at the 1976 Olympic trials, also in Eugene.[27][43] The record in Eugene was a hybrid score because a timing system failure and wind aided marks. Still, Jenner was proud of "A nice little workout, huh?"
"We got what we wanted. We scared the hell out of everybody in the world only a month away from the Games."[44]
Of the 13 decathlons Jenner competed in between 1973 and 1976, the only loss was at the 1975 AAU National Championships, when a "no height" in the pole vault marred the score.[25]
At the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal, Jenner achieved five personal bests on the first day of the men's decathlon – a "home run" – despite being in second place behind Guido Kratschmer of West Germany. Jenner was confident: "The second day has all my good events. If everything works out all right, we should be ahead after it's all over." Following a rainstorm on the second day, Jenner watched teammate Fred Dixon get injured in the 110 meter hurdles,[45] so took a cautious approach to the hurdles and discus, then had personal bests in the pole vault, when Jenner took the lead, and javelin.[46] By that point, victory was virtually assured, but it remained to be seen by how much Jenner would improve the record. In the final event—the 1500 meters, which was seen live on national television—Jenner looked content to finish the long competition. Jenner sprinted the last lap, making up a 50-meter deficit and nearly catching the event favorite, Soviet Leonid Litvinenko, who was already well out of contention for the gold medal, but whose personal best had been eight seconds better than Jenner's personal best before the race. Jenner set a new personal best time and won the gold medal with a world-record score of 8,618 points
Impact
After the event, Jenner took an American flag from a spectator and carried it during the victory lap, starting a tradition that is now common among winning athletes.[50][51] Abandoning vaulting poles in the stadium, with no intention of ever competing again, Jenner stated that: "In 1972, I made the decision that I would go four years and totally dedicate myself to what I was doing, and then I would move on after it was over with. I went into that competition knowing that would be the last time I would ever do this."[29] Jenner explained, "It hurts every day when you practice hard. Plus, when this decathlon is over, I got the rest of my life to recuperate. Who cares how bad it hurts?"[5]
As a result of winning the Olympic decathlon, Jenner became a national hero and received the James E. Sullivan Award as the top amateur athlete in the United States and was also named the Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year in 1976.[4][22]
Jenner's 1976 world and Olympic record was broken by four points by Daley Thompson at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow; Thompson's victory was perhaps tainted by the U.S.-led boycott of the Moscow Olympics in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, though the top American at the time, Bobby Coffman, was not expected to push Thompson or challenge Jenner's record. In 1985, Jenner's Olympic decathlon score was reevaluated against the IAAF's updated decathlon scoring table and was reported as 8,634 for comparative purposes. This converted mark stood as the American record until 1991, when it was surpassed by eventual gold medalist, and world record holder, Dan O'Brien of Dan & Dave fame.[52] As of 2018, Jenner was ranked twenty-sixth on the world all-time list and ninth on the American all-time list.[53]
Jenner was inducted into the United States National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1980, the Olympic Hall of Fame in 1986, the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame and the Connecticut Sports Hall of Fame in 1994, and the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame in 2010.[54] For almost 20 years, San Jose City College hosted an annual Bruce Jenner Invitational competition
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