RMC Fencing Tournament

I've just recently been added to the varsity fencing team! On Saturday, we drove from Carleton U at 5am down to Kingston for the day to compete at a fencing tournament at the Royal Military College. I'm competing with a group of four on the school foil team. We traveled with the men's sabre and women's épée team. The way it works is each team of four for every weapon competes against other teams of four, from other universities or private clubs. To win, each team has to make 45 touches before the other, and each player has to make 5 touches in every bout within 2 minutes. It's organized into a round robin at first and then instant knock-out after each team plays three other teams in the round robin.

The men's foil team started the day off (in fact, I was the starting player and only rookie on the team...Pressure!). It was all good though, I didn't do too bad in the first bout -- lost 5-2. We ended up barely winning the first series 45-36ish. After that, we completely dismantled the next team 45-22, but got whooped 45-28ish in the next series. We were able to gain enough points in our group to move on to the knock-out round but lost horribly in the first series...I won't even repeat the score. But whatever, it was lots of fun and our team deserved hundreds of style points. We ended up placing 17th out of 35 teams, which ain't too shabby for having a huge rookie on the team.

I snapped together a load of clips from the tournament. In every clip, Carleton is on the left side of the screen. If you don't know what's going on, don't worry, it's hard to decipher in real life. It's really fast. Keep on eye for the green/red light in the background to every bout, it tells you which side made a hit. (You won't find me in the clips, my madskillz are too frightening to watch).

Fencing Clips

[Duel Frédéric Madec / Claude Gisbert]


["En Garde" - Animated Short]

Beginner's Fencing Tournament

The fencing shin dig went down last night with bouts of legend. It was organized with an initial four-game round robin and a second stage knock-out. I was in a bit of scramble showing up late to the tournament and was in a fluster for the first match where I was completely skunked in a 3-0 loss. From then on however I was able to redeem myself to win three in a row and progress to the knockout as 2nd ranked in my group. After some technical confusion in forgetting to add me to the list, I was able to win my first knock out match but was robbed in the next. Ahead 2-0, I lost 3-2. It was a great competition, but kind of hilarious how all the footwork training went out the window for everyone. There were improv dance steps and epic Braveheart-esque battle charges happening all over the place.

We have a website. There will be a team photo up there soon.

A video will soon be available of one of my bouts. Stand by.

Fencing Tournament

I don't think I've mentioned this very much (if at all) but I joined the Carleton fencing team back in September. Three other classmates have all joined at the same time (Will Klassen, Pat Bisson, Mathieu Blais). We practice every Tuesday and Thursday night. It's pretty good exercise -- a lot of agility and speed drills. Above all, it's tons of fun.

There are three weapon types: foil, épée and sabre. Our last practice was the first time using épée and sabre. The difference is pretty simple between each style. In foil you can only target the torso of your opponent with the point of the foil. With épée you can target the entire body with the point, and with sabre you can target any part of the body with the full length of the sabre. Sabre is really wild and a bit undisciplined when starting out. It's pretty much just hack and slash at your opponent. For now, I'm keen on learning épée instead.

Tomorrow there will be a beginner's tournament as well as varsity try-outs. The tourney is pretty simple -- just make it through the whole class undefeated and you win prizes!