Fiona May

Fiona May

Personal information
Nationality	Italian
Born	(1969-12-12) 12 December 1969 (age 54) Slough, England
Height	1.81 m (5 ft 11+1⁄2 in)
Weight	60 kg (132 lb)
Sport
Country	Italy
Sport	Athletics
Event	Long jump
Achievements and titles
Personal best	7.11 m (1998)
Medal record Representing  Italy Event 1st 2nd 3rd Olympic Games 0 2 0 World Championships 2 1 1 European Championships 0 1 1 World Indoor Championships 1 0 0 European Indoor Championships 1 0 0 Mediterranean Games 1 0 0 European Cup 3 2 3 Total 8 6 5 Olympic Games 1996 Atlanta Long jump 2000 Sydney Long jump World Championships 1995 Gothenburg Long jump 2001 Edmonton Long jump 1999 Seville Long jump 1997 Athens Long jump World Indoor Championships 1997 Paris Long jump European Championships 1998 Budapest Long jump 1994 Helsinki Long jump European Indoor Championships 1998 Valencia Long jump Representing  Great Britain Event 1st 2nd 3rd Universiade 1 0 0 European Cup 0 0 3 Commonwealth Games 1990 Auckland Long jump World Junior Championships 1988 Sudbury Long jump

Fiona May (born 12 December 1969) is a retired track and field athlete who competed for the United Kingdom and later Italy in the long jump. She won the World Championships twice and two Olympic silver medals. Her personal best jump was 7.11 metres, which was her silver medal result at the 1998 European Championships.

She also competed briefly in the triple jump, and her career best of 14.65 metres from 1998 was good enough to place fifth in the world that season.^[1] May originally competed for Great Britain, but became an Italian citizen upon her marriage to her coach Gianni Iapichino in 1994. May missed the whole 2002 season as a result of her pregnancy and childbirth. Her last significant competition was the 2005 World Championships, where she failed to reach the final.^[2] May and Iapichino were married until 2011.

Born in Slough and raised in Derby, May attended Leeds Trinity & All Saints College,^[3] a college affiliated with the University of Leeds, studying economics, business management and administration. In 2006, she retired from competitions and started a new successful career in show business. After some modelling, she became the spokeswoman of the Kinder snacks and she won the Italian version of Dancing with the Stars in 2006. Later that year her acting debut was broadcast on Rai Uno as the protagonist of Butta la luna, a miniseries about racism and social integration.^[4]

In 2019, Fiona May become the testimonial of the Italian Salesians of Don Bosco's missions in Africa and particularly of their Ethiopian activities for mothers.^[5][6]

May's parents are Jamaican,^[7] and she is also rugby player Marcel Garvey's cousin. In 1994, she married her coach Gianni Iapichino, a former pole vaulter whose best achievements were a fifth and sixth place at the European Indoor Championships in 1992 and 1994;^[8] she gave birth to their daughter Larissa in 2002. Larissa is following her parents' footsteps, winning the Italian and European titles for the 300 metres hurdles^[9] and the long jump silver medal at the 2023 European Indoor Championships.^[10]

Year	Competition	Venue	Position	Notes
Representing  Great Britain and  England
1986	World Junior Championships	Athens, Greece	8th	6.11 m
1987	European Junior Championships	Birmingham, United Kingdom	1st	6.64 m w
1988	World Junior Championships	Sudbury, Canada	1st	6.88 m w (wind: +2.1 m/s)
	Olympic Games	Seoul, South Korea	6th	6.62 m
1990	Commonwealth Games	Auckland, New Zealand	3rd	6.55 m
	European Championships	Split, Yugoslavia	7th	6.77 m (wind: +1.3 m/s)
1991	World Championships	Tokyo, Japan	19th (q)	6.54 m
1992	Olympic Games	Barcelona, Spain	—	NM
1993	World Championships	Stuttgart, Germany	14th (q)	6.42 m
Representing  Italy
1994	European Championships	Helsinki, Finland	3rd	6.90 m (wind: -0.7 m/s)
1995	World Championships	Gothenburg, Sweden	1st	6.98 m w
1996	Olympic Games	Atlanta, United States	2nd	7.02 m
	IAAF Grand Prix Final	Milan, Italy	3rd	6.86 m
1997	World Indoor Championships	Paris, France	1st	6.86 m
	World Championships	Athens, Greece	3rd	6.91 m
1998	European Indoor Championships	Valencia, Spain	1st	6.91 m
	European Championships	Budapest, Hungary	2nd	7.11 m
1999	World Championships	Sevilla, Spain	2nd	6.94 m
2000	Olympic Games	Sydney, Australia	2nd	6.92 m
2001	World Indoor Championships	Lisbon, Portugal	4th	6.87 m
	World Championships	Edmonton, Canada	1st	7.02 m w
2003	World Championships	Paris, France	9th	6.46 m
2004	World Indoor Championships	Budapest, Hungary	6th	6.64 m
	Olympic Games	Athens, Greece	28th (q)	6.38 m
2005	Mediterranean Games	Almería, Spain	1st	6.64 m

• Italian sportswomen multiple medalists at Olympics and World Championships
• Italian record progression women's long jump
• Italian all-time lists – Long jump
• Italian all-time lists – Triple jump
• FIDAL Hall of Fame
• Naturalized athletes of Italy

• Fiona May at World Athletics
• Fiona May at the Italian Athletics Federation (in Italian)
• Fiona May at Olympics.com
• Fiona May at Olympedia
• Fiona May at the Italian National Olympic Committee (in Italian)
• Fiona May at IMDb