NOT since the era of Babe Didriksen and Fanny Blankers-Koen has there been a female athlete of such outstanding potential as the American, Marion Jones, who confirmed yesterday that she not only wants to upstage Carl Lewis and Jesse Owens by winning five Olympic gold medals in the 2000 Olympics, but also at next year's World Championships in Seville.

Lewis, the nine-times Olympic champion, acknowledged his countrywoman's capacity to re-write history, but to do so Jones will need the kind of support which sporting authorities denied both Didriksen or Blankers-Koen.

This week, Jones clocked 10.71 seconds for 100 metres in China, fastest by a woman for 10 years, at last putting Florence Griffith-Joyner's world record under threat. Already holding the year's best marks at 200m and long jump, Jones added that she has set her sights on these three individual titles, plus gold in both relays, in Seville and Sydney. ''They are lofty goals, but I don't think they are unrealistic if I stay healthy,'' she said.

''It is a tough schedule,'' observed Lewis. ''I can only speak for doing four events, but the key is the long jump. The pounding from the jump is what takes most out of legs and body. If she can stay injury-free, and master the jump, I think Marion has every chance.''

Officers of the International Amateur Athletic Federation meet world event organisers in Spain a week on Friday, and Jones's aspirations are known to them. With the IAAF having designated 1998 as the Year of Women, she must have a good chance of the timetable facilitating her hopes.

Accommodations were made to help Michael Johnson achieve the 200/400 double in both Athens and Atlanta, and Jones's agent, Charlie Wells, speaking from Texas, said he would seek similar support for his client: ''The long jump and 200 often clash. As soon as we see the schedule, we'll check it out.''

The Californian, on just 17 weeks' training after having switched from basketball, took the world 100m title in Athens last summer. She already tops this year's world rankings at 100m (10.71) and 200m (21.98), performances superior to those which won the last World and Olympic golds.

Last weekend in Japan, making only one attempt, Jones reached 7.05 metres - best long jump in the world this year and equalling last August's world title-winner in Athens. Last month, in her only 400m since high school, she was timed at 50.27 - third on this year's world lists.

Yet the soft-spoken Jones entertains no hype over the 10.49 world sprint best by the controversial Flo-Jo, now the only woman to have run faster than her. ''I'm not in a hurry,'' said Jones. ''If it comes, it comes - and I am sure it will in the next couple of years. I got a good start in China, but I made a couple of errors.''

Tall and elegant, she could, if she wished, have a future as a celebrity model like fellow sprinters Merlene Ottey and Marie-Jose Perec, but the woman who has a foot bone held in place by a screw - legacy of a trampoline accident - says: ''I'm a tomboy. I prefer T-shirts, sweat-suits and sneakers. You won't see me on the catwalk, in a bodysuit or tights, and showing off my nails. I'm not into that at all - and I doubt if you will see me designing my own line of clothing.''

At 15, Jones was fastest girl of her age that the world had seen. Though she regrets having turned down a 1992 Olympic relay place, believing she was too young, she does not regret basketball. Bored with track, she let her 5ft 10ins loose as a point guard, and led North Carolina University to the NCAA title.

''Basketball is still my first love, but I did not want to be 50, and look back wondering what I could have and should have done on track . . . I have never worked a day in my life,'' she said with a giggle. She sees nothing wrong with earning a living from sport - ''whatever floats your boat''.

Wells said she is eager to attain equality for women athletes. She currently receives $40,000 per meet, far less than leading men. ''We are out to change the pay structure of women's track and field,'' said Wells. Yet the pressure of the US professional sports market makes advertising deals scarce. Her equipment package with Nike apart, she endorses only Oakley sun glasses and Tag Heuer watches.

That could soon change, especially if, as I believe, records fall ahead of Jones's schedule. She had negligible wind assistance in China (0.1sec), and is running exceptionally fast for early season. If conditions and opposition are right, Flo-Jo's 200m and 100m marks may not survive this grand prix summer, and it will be another step towards history.

Texan Didriksen, born in 1911, seven years before Holland's Blankers-Koen, set world records in javelin and hurdles, established a US long jump best which survived from 1930-'53, held the world mark, unofficially, for 100 yards, and had qualified for all five women's athletics events at Los Angeles in 1932. Mysoginist Olympic rules ensured she could attempt only three.

She won the 80m hurdles and javelin, and took silver in the high jump despite setting a world record. She did this in a jump-off for the title, but officials ruled her Western Roll style amounted to crossing the bar head first, and she was relegated to second. The record itself was allowed to stand - and the Western Roll was legalised shortly after. She remains the only woman to medal in running, jumping and throwing in the same Olympics.

Like Jones, she was a basketball star before athletics, winning all-American honours thrice. She also once scored 13 home runs in a baseball game against males. She turned to golf, won the British and US amateur titles, 14 successive pro tournaments, and three US Opens (1948, '50 and '54) before dying of cancer in 1956.

Blankers-Koen, a mother of two, arrived for the 1948 London Olympics owning six of the 16 career world records in eight events which she was eventually to set. These included the long and high jumps, but the timetable would accommodate her only in the 100m, 200m, 80m hurdles, and relay. She took gold in all four - the women's record Jones is now attempting to challenge.