He attended Pinecrest Elementary School, Lakewood Intermediate School,
Beaver Brae Secondary School in Kenora, Ontario, and then
Central Technical School in Toronto for his final year of high school. Smith attended the
University of Toronto Commerce program during his athletic career. He was coached by Andy Higgins while living in
Toronto, Ontario and then by Les Gramantik when he moved to live and train in
Calgary, Alberta in 1994. Smith won a silver medal at the World Junior Track and Field Championships in 1986. At the
1988 Olympics in
Seoul, he placed 14th. At the 1990
Commonwealth Games Smith won a gold medal. In 1991, he was the silver medal winner at the
World Track and Field Championships, and was the first North American to win the
Götzis International Decathlon, which he won again in 1996. In 1992 at
Barcelona, Spain, Smith was the opening ceremonies flag bearer for
Canada at the Olympics. Unfortunately during the decathlon Smith pulled a hamstring and was forced to withdraw on the first day of the two-day competition. In 1994, he won gold at the Commonwealth Games for the second time. Smith was ranked in the top 10 in the world for 10 years in a row from 1989 to 1998 with his highest rankings being #2 in the world in 1991 and #3 in the world in 1995.
Personal Best Performances Smith held the Canadian Record in the decathlon with a total of 8626 points set in Gotzis Austria in 1996. Smith's record was broken by
Damian Warner, with a total of 8659 points, at the
2015 Pan American Games. The sum of Smith's overall personal bests in the individual disciplines of decathlon totals 9,362 points (the third best ever after
Ashton Eaton &
Dan O'Brien). ==Achievements==