Keeth Smart
*Keeth Smart was born on this date in 1978. He is a Black Fencer and former Olympic athlete.
From Brooklyn at the age of 14, his parents made him choose between the more traditional sports he was involved with and fencing. He is the son of Thomas R. Smart Jr., a production manager and economist, and Liz Smart, a teacher. Smart graduated from Brooklyn Technical High School in 1996. At the urging of his parents, he and his younger sister Erinn began to learn fencing at the Peter Westbrook Foundation.
He graduated from St. John's University in New York, majoring in finance. During college, he was the NCAA saber champion in 1997 and 1999 and took second place in 2001. He was a member of the 1999 Pan American Games bronze medal team. He has competed in three Olympic games.
In the individual Olympic men's saber competition, he placed 30th in the 2000 Olympic games, 15th in 2004, 4th in the team event, and 6th in 2008, and he won the silver medal in the team event. His sister Erinn also earned a silver medal at the 2008 Olympics. In 2002 and 2004, Smart won the US national saber championship. In 2003, he became the first American to be named the top-ranked fencer internationally.
Smart married Shyra Cooper in 2007 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. She is a film producer with an undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from New York University. Smart received his MBA from Columbia University in 2010.
