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Smart Foil
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Courtesy: Susan Hansen, Barnard Magazine
You've got to hand it to Olympic medal-winner Erinn Smart
'01: She has a real knack for keeping fencing fans on the edge of their seats.
Smart, a member of the United States women's foil team, definitely delivered
some extra drama last August at the world Olympics competition in Beijing - especially
in the highstakes match against Hungary. She and her teammates had managed to
build a 14-point edge against the heavily favored Hungarians when Smart took
the floor for a final, critical bout. Her opponent, Aida Mohamed, immediately
went on the attack, scoring touch after touch against Smart to cut the American
lead down to just two points: It looked as if they were headed for a heartbreaking
defeat. But the Barnard alumna found her focus, and came back with crucial points
to clinch the bout and match, helping her team score the silver. "A lot of other
people would have freaked out, but Erinn really kept her cool," says Olympic
teammate Hanna Thompson, who recalls that Smart later joked about the nail-biting
finish. "She told us she likes to keep things exciting."
For her part, Smart says she's just relieved she hung on and didn't let her
teammates down. And she notes that the victory was all the sweeter because going
into Beijing, the U.S. women's fencing team was ranked just seventh in the world.
"We were underdogs, we weren't expected to win."
The 28-year-old alumna had actually been to two previous Olympics - the 2000 summer
games in Sydney, where she served as alternate for the U.S. team, and the Athens
2004 games, where she finished 17th in the individual fencing competition. She's
thrilled that her dream of coming home with an Olympic medal finally came true.
"It's like winning the Super Bowl; it was surreal."
Smart grew up in Brooklyn and has been working for that moment most of her life.
She started fencing at age 11, after her father read about a fencing program
for inner-city kids run by the Peter Westbrook Foundation in Harlem. He urged
both Erinn and her brother, Keeth, two years her senior, to give the sport a
try.
Both siblings joined the program and were quickly hooked. And they continued
fencing through high school, college, and into last summer's Olympics. (Keeth,
a star on the U.S. men's fencing team, also brought home a silver medal from
Beijing last summer, and is now working on his MBA at Columbia Business School.)
At Barnard, Erinn majored in economic history, but she also joined the Barnard/Columbia
women's fencing team. When she wasn't in class or studying, she spent almost
all of her free time fencing - either practicing or at team competitions. "The
Barnard/Columbia team is amazing,"says Smart, who adds that two of her former
teammates were also on the U.S. Olympics squad at the 2004 summer games in Athens.
To read Hansen's feature in its entirety, as found in the current issue of
Barnard Magazine, please click here.
