Matt Carpenter (runner)

Matt Carpenter

Matt Carpenter, 42, approaching the summit of Pikes Peak during the 2006 Pikes Peak Marathon. Carpenter reached the summit in 2:08:27 on his way to a 3:33:07 win in the Marathon.
Personal information
Born	(1964-07-20) July 20, 1964 (age 53) Asheville, North Carolina
Height	1.70 m (5 ft 7 in)
Weight	55.8 kg (123 lb)
Sport
Country	United States
Sport	Ultramarathoner
Event(s)	high altitude marathons - Trail running

Matthew Edwin Carpenter (born July 20, 1964) is an award-winning American Ultramarathoner as a trail runner and in high altitude marathons.

Carpenter was born in North Carolina, before moving to Kentucky and then Mississippi while in high school. He took up running while living there, because he had "nothing else to do". Over time it became a way to fund his college education, and subsequently an escape from bereavement in the period following the death of his mother.

As a student at the University of Southern Mississippi he frequently visited Colorado, and moved there after graduation, first to Vail in 1987, then to Colorado Springs four years later, before settling in Manitou Springs in 1998.

Carpenter stands at 1.70 m (5 ft 7 in) and weighs 55.8 kg (123 lb). In 1990, his VO₂ max, a measure of the body's ability to intake oxygen, was calculated to be 90.2 during tests at the U.S. Olympic Training Center, the highest they had recorded. This, and his rigorous training regime—he claims to have run daily for over five years between 1997 and his daughter's birth in 2002—are credited as the keys to his enduring success.

After signing with Fila Skyrunners in 1993, he won either thirteen or fifteen of the seventeen high altitude marathons he entered, setting records at both 14,350 feet (4,370 m) (with a time of 2:52:57) and 17,060 feet (5,200 m) (a time of 3:22:25). Later in his career he moved to ultrarunning, and sustained his previous success, setting course records in the San Juan Solstice 50-mile race in Lake City, Colorado in 2004, and breaking the record for the Leadville Trail 100 race in 2005 by over an hour and a half.