It took two decades for 2004 USATF 100K team member Carolyn Smith to move from her mile specialty where she has a PR of 4:54, to ultras. It took just 2 years of running ultras to meet her goal of becoming a 100K team member. Running just six ultras, Smith moved purposefully from her first 50-mile trail race at the 2002 Ice Age 50 mile in her home state of Wisconsin to the 135-mile Badwater Ultramarathon through Death Valley to the portals of Mt Whitney this July.

Smith, a family practice and sports medicine physician who serves as the Director of Clinical Services at Marquette University Student Health Service and the Team Physician for the university’s Department of Intercollegiate Athletics, runs because she can. Smith explains her running abilities and motivation with, "I enjoy it; I’m blessed with the ability and possess a true love for the sport. I love the simplicity and purity of self-propulsion."

Smith will run with the USATF 100K Team competing at IAAF World Cup 100K in Winschoten, the Netherlands on September 11, 2004.

After competing at the 2004 World Cup 100K, Smith dreams of running ultra classics Western States in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains and canyons of the American River and the Comrades Marathon in South Africa as well as ultras in other exotic places.