Melanie Smith

Melanie Smith (born September 23, 1949) is an equestrian from the United States and Olympic champion. She was born in Germantown, Tennessee, and grew up on her parents' farm learning to ride horses. She won several amateur competitions and got better at her sport, advancing into the Grand Prix class in 1976. She won many of the top competitions in this class over her long career in show jumping. She was on the U.S. gold medal team in the Pan American Games in 1979, riding Val de Loire. She qualified for the 1980 Olympics, but did not compete due to the U.S. Olympic Committee's boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, Russia. She was one of 461 athletes to receive a Congressional Gold Medal instead. She also won a bronze medal in the individual jumping category on Calypso at the Alternate Olympics. She qualified for the Olympics again four years later in 1984, and helped win the first team gold for the U.S. in Olympic Show Jumping, again riding Calypso. In 1980 she placed second in the World Cup on Calypso, and at the 1982 World Cup, she won. She also rode Calypso to help the U.S. team win the Nations Cup and the World Cup in 1983. She won the show jumping triple crown on Calypso, becoming one of two riders to achieve that honor, as well as the only horse/rider team ever to do it. Smith was inducted into the Show Jumping Hall of Fame in 1988. Her mount, Calypso, is in the Show Jumping Hall of Fame. Smith was included in the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame in 1998.