Monica Joyce (born July 16, 1958) is an English turned Irish turned American long distance runner. She is the younger sister of Irish marathoner

Regina Joyce Regina Joyce (born February 7, 1957) is a retired female long-distance runner originally from Ireland. She competed at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, finishing 23rd in the marathon. Her younger sister Monica also competed in the 1984 O ...

. Both sisters represented Ireland in the

1984 Summer Olympics The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an international multi-sport event held from July 28 to August 12, 1984, in Los Angeles, California, United States. It marked the secon ...

, Regina in the

Marathon The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...

and Monica in the

3000 meters The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the "3K" or "3K run", where 7.5 laps are run around an outdoor 400 m track, or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track. It is debated whether the 3000m shoul ...

. Previous to the Olympics Monica had represented Ireland at the

1982 European Athletics Championships The 13th European Athletics Championships were held from 6 September to 12 September 1982 at the Olympic Stadium in Athens, Greece. Contemporaneous reports on the event were given in the Glasgow Herald. Men's results Compl ...

, the 1983 World Championship and the 1984 World Cross Country Championships. She also ran in the 1985 World Cross Country Championships, finishing 12th and the

IAAF World Women's Road Race Championships The IAAF World Women's Road Race Championships was an annual international athletics championship in road running organised by the International Association of Athletics Federations (then known as the International Amateur Athletics Federation). It ...

finishing 8th. At home she was the Irish National Champion in the

1500 metres The 1500 metres or 1,500-metre run (typically pronounced 'fifteen-hundred metres') is the foremost middle distance track event in athletics. The distance has been contested at the Summer Olympics since 1896 and the World Championships in Athletic ...

in 1982, 1983 and 1988 with

Sonia O'Sullivan Sonia O'Sullivan (born 28 November 1969) is an Irish people, Irish former track and field athlete. She won a gold medal in the 5000 metres at the 1995 World Championships in Athletics, 1995 World Championships, and a silver medal in the 5000 met ...

a main competitor. Across the channel, she was the English National Champion in the

5000 metres The 5000 metres or 5000-metre run is a common long-distance running event in track and field, approximately equivalent to or . It is one of the track events in the Olympic Games and the World Championships in Athletics, run over laps of a stan ...

in 1982 and 1985, beating her sister in 1982. Both sisters grew up with their parents in

Sussex, England Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English C ...

. She was winning cross country races as early as age 11. Both sisters originally competed for England as junior athletes but switched to Ireland in 1982, based on the citizenship of their parents, for competitive reasons. Before embarking on her international career, she competed for

San Diego State University San Diego State University (SDSU) is a public research university in San Diego, California. Founded in 1897 as San Diego Normal School, it is the third-oldest university and southernmost in the 23-member California State University (CSU) system ...

for two and a half years, finishing second in the

at the

NCAA Women's Outdoor Track and Field Championship The NCAA Women's Outdoor Track and Field Championship refers to one of three annual collegiate outdoor track and field competitions for women organised by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) for athletes from institutions that make ...

s in 1981. She married her college coach Fred La Plante, who continued to coach her. She became a U.S. citizen in 2000.http://www.runningusa.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=pages.monica-joyce
/ref> She has continued running into masters age divisions, in 2002 she won the

Gasparilla Distance Classic The Gasparilla Distance Classic is a road race which is held in late February or early March on Bayshore Boulevard in Tampa, Florida. Over 30,000 competitors participate each year. It is named after the Gasparilla Pirate Festival, which takes place ...

15K outright at age 43. At age 50, she beat the W50 World Record in the 5,000 meters at the

Mt. SAC Relays The Mt. SAC Relays are an annual track and field festival held primarily at Hilmer Lodge Stadium on the Mt. San Antonio College campus in Walnut, California. The Relays are held in mid-April each year since the first edition held on April 24-25, 1 ...

, running 16:19.51. That year she also added the 15K road running W50 world record, running 52:38 at the

Gate River Run The Gate River Run (GRR), formerly known as the Jacksonville River Run, is an annual road running event in Jacksonville, Florida, United States, that attracts both competitive and recreational runners. It has functioned as the US National Champi ...

. She also added American records in the 5K, 8K and 10K, the latter for a second time with a 30-second improvement.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Joyce, Monica 1958 births Living people Irish female long-distance runners World Athletics Championships athletes for Ireland Olympic athletes for Ireland Athletes (track and field) at the 1984 Summer Olympics World record holders in masters athletics San Diego State Aztecs women's track and field athletes