There are 15 feet separating track and field star Katy Craig and a trip to the 2004 summer Olympic Games in Athens, Greece.

Craig, a junior, began her Ohio State career as a walk-on to the track team in weight and hammer throws. She has since earned a well-deserved athletic scholarship.

Craig holds the school record in the outdoor hammer throw at 199.8 meters and the indoor weight throw at 64 feet, 11 inches. She qualified for the NCAA championships in 2000.

Saturday at the Bearcat Classic, she destroyed the competition in the hammer throw by nearly three meters and by almost two meters in the discus.

In February, Craig was named to the Indoor All-Big Ten Team after winning the Big Ten Championship in the weight-throw event. This follows last year’s All-American team honors, after the Indoor NCAA Championships. She is also a scholar athlete.

Craig will compete at 9 a.m. Sunday at the Jesse Owens Classic at the Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium.

Craig gets personal satisfaction knowing she belongs to the OSU team; she didn’t let being a walk-on stand in the way of her accomplishments.

“Coming into college I was a walk-on and I didn’t really have any high expectations for myself as far as college sports,” Craig said. “It’s re-assurance that I can be here, and I’m at the right place and that I can compete at this level.

“The two events that I do, they don’t do in middle school or high school because they’re too dangerous. I came in as a walk-on and started to do them and found out that I kind of had an affinity for them.”

Craig has been participating in track since the seventh grade. She has gotten used to the fact that her sport is not one of the big name sports; at most of the meets, the throwing events are separated from the track and the fans.

Craig began her career as a sprinter at Hilliard Middle School and a coach suggested that she try the throwing events. She still holds the record in the shot put and discus at Hilliard High School and has continued to excel in a sport that is not often associated with female athletes.

She likes being recognized as an athlete, but at 6 feet 2 inches tall and 200 pounds, she is often mistaken for a basketball player. She uses all of her size and strength, with the hammer weighing 8.5 pounds and the indoor weight weighing 20 pounds.

“It was a build-specific thing,” Katy said. “I’m just built more for that than anything else in track.”

She attributes her improvement to the addition of her coach John Smith.

“We got a new coach my sophomore year. His wife is a four-time Olympian and he’s coached numerous Olympians. He helps a tremendous amount to teach me how to do my events; I don’t think that I would be nearly as good at them if he didn’t come here to coach.”

Smith said he sees Craig as an ambitious athlete who is passionate and does everything to the utmost. He has also seen growth in the co-captain. She has gone from what he calls “an old neighborhood thrower” to an All-American.

“Her confidence has doubled or tripled. She is not afraid to tackle anything,” Smith said. “She has grown into a decent leader.”

Craig is looking toward the 2004 Olympics but admits she has a lot of work ahead of her before she can reach that goal. The competition among the female throwers will be tough; there are many talented women who also have the same goals.

“It’s another 13 or 14 feet, I believe, to be eligible to be in the Olympic Games. Then once you get to that point, you have to make the team,” Craig said. “It’s so far away, it’s hard to know where I’ll be then, but I think it’s a possibility.”

She has gained about 60 feet since her freshman best of 135 feet in the hammer throw and she has gained about 20 feet in the weight throw.

“It’ll be tough. But Katy has all the talent and ability to do it,” Smith said.

Smith feels Craig’s evolution will be smaller, in feet and inches now, instead of the leaps and bounds since freshman year.

One of the people she looks up to is Smith’s wife, U.S. thrower Connie Price-Smith, who competed in the last four Olympics. Not only does Craig look up to her as a thrower, but as a woman.

“She’s done just about everything that a female thrower can do,” Craig said. “She’s made a million teams and at the same time she’s very humble and polite and soft-spoken. I think that’s very admirable. I’m trying to work on that myself, trying to be a classy athlete.”

While training with her role model, Craig realizes just how much work it takes to reach Olympic status. She also knows her competition is working just as hard. No one puts more pressure on Craig than herself and she is willing to put in the work.

Craig, a business operations management major with a 3.2 GPA, chose business because she considers it a safe major.

Craig lives with her parents and older brother and finds living at home to be an advantage. Her parents’ support has been a wonderful asset to her career. They’ve helped her pay for summer meets that OSU doesn’t support, and her mother, Mary, is a traveling companion when the team isn’t there.

“My parents are really understanding of the fact that I’m a college student and let me do what I want to do,” Craig said. “I’m really glad I came to Ohio State even though it’s so close. I was born a Buckeye. My parents both went to Ohio State and as soon as Ohio State started to talk to me about walking-on to the track team here, I was sold.

“They’re (parents) not pushy, but if I said I wanted to quit track they would understand. At the same time, they want to see me be all that I can be and get everything I can get out of it.”

Her mother enjoys watching the events and she gets a kick out of being around her daughter. She finds the events’ power and speed to be fascinating aspects of the sport. They attend two or three events during each of the indoor and outdoor seasons, and Mary Craig will travel with her daughter to some of the summer events.

Like most parents, she is very proud of her daughter’s achievements. “She has worked so hard and the coaches have worked hard. It’s nice to see success and achievement,” Mary Craig said.

In high school, Katy Craig graduated with above a 4.0 GPA. She participated in basketball as well as her field events.

Katy and her older brother Bill, 21, are very supportive of each other. Mary Craig remembers her kids laughing a lot when they were together as younger children.

Katy Craig’s sense of humor and her ability to focus to be two of her daughter’s biggest assets, Mary Craig said.

At OSU, Katy Craig takes a light load of classes each quarter, about 15 hours, so she can balance being a student with her athletic career. She spends 21-27 hours a week practicing her throwing and lifting weights. She aspires to being a football player, if at all possible, and thinks her size would be an asset.

Academics and athletics don’t leave much free time, but when she gets it, she enjoys sleeping, dancing and sports. Katy said her favorite food is fettucini Alfredo, and one of her favorite places to eat is The Cooker.