Imperial College Fencing Club

It was a crisp Saturday morning as a group of Imperial fencers headed out to St Paul’s School Sports Hall for the London Team Trophy. The number of entries for the competition was its highest ever, with 16 epee teams, 16 foil teams and 12 sabre teams, making the competition the second biggest team event in the country after the National Championships. Representing Imperial were three full teams. In foil: Imperial 1st with Ed Collier, Chris Gilliam, Outi Supponen and Robert Shaw. In epee: Imperial 1st consisting of Ed Gilhead, Marcello Colombino and Miles Gandolfi and Imperial 2nd with Thorsten Hamann, Charlotte Levin and Peter Cronbach. In both weapons, we had previous year’s results to defend, gold for the foil team and silver for epee.

In the epee, Imperial 1st won all their matches in the first round without much trouble, while in the foil Imperial 1st also kept their level high with the same result. Imperial 2nd epee lost one out of three matches and won the rest with a comforting margin. All teams easily qualified for the quarterfinal knock out rounds.

In the quarterfinal draw for the epee, Imperial 1st were faced once again with a young ULU team they had meet in the first round and Imperial 2nd was up against a team called “+39”, a hint that the entire team originated from Italy. Imperial 2nd unfortunately had to admit themselves defeated by the skilled Italians. Though the sad faces did not last for long as Imperial 1 methodically made their way to the final, convincingly beating +39 in the semis. In the final they faced Brixton, a strong team of young fencers. The match was even, swaying back and through all the way to the last period where Imperial showed the value of experience and keeping their nerves under control to win the match and clinch gold.

Meanwhile, in another hall, the foil team was presenting results similar to the first team epeeists. They cruised their way to victory in both quarterfinal and semi-final, but were defeated in the final by Salle Paul EU, a very strong team from one of the country’s top clubs. This was a small let down compared to last year, when they had won gold, but they at least had the honour to have the President of British Fencing, Keith Smith, as a referee in the last match. When we left the hall at the end of the day, after prize ceremony and high-fives, we were all tired but happy off to enjoy the delights of Halloween.

by Charlotte Levin.

(For a video of the Foil final see http://vimeo.com/16367927 )

Don’t take our word for it, that was the title that BUCS gave to their article on the BUCS Fencing Individuals:

Imperial reign supreme on the final day of the BUCS Fencing Individuals

Today saw Hannah Bryers from Imperial College, London claim her fourth Women’s Foil Championship in four years over Nikki Barlow from Brunel University.  A fellow competitor from Imperial, Outi Supponen came joint third along with Luisa De Sordi from the University of Kent.

Imperial continued to shine in the Men’s Sabre competition.  Every competitor was expecting Franceso Egro from the University of Bristol to retain his title once again, but he met his match against Stephen Fenwick from Northumbria in the last 16.  Fenwick then went on to lose against the eventual winner, Maiyuran Ratneswaran from Imperial.  Coming in second was Dominic Kerr from Oxford, with Matt Billing (Bristol) and Henry Gann (Imperial) taking the bronze medals.

Congratulations to everyone who went!

Full results for Imperial fencers after the jump: (more…)

An injury-stricken team make the crowd shout with excitement at the finals BUCS Champs…

Having scraped a win against Cambridge in the quarter-finals the women’s fencing team were heading to Sheffield for the BUCS championships. In the semi-finals the team were facing Birmingham. It was decided to start the match with epee, knowing that Birmingham had a strong epee team, this was not going to be easy. The Imperial epee team consisting of team captain Emily Bottle, Hannah Bryars and Joan Chang, did a fantastic job of keeping the match close throughout and limited what could have been a significantly worse loss to 2 hits. The same team then continued for the foil, this time though the odds looked to be more in their favour. Things started well with the foil team taking a quick lead to 10-0. After this the problems started, a few unfortunate yellow cards, with the Birmingham team starting to catch up, then Joan fell and twisted her ankle. This meant Gabrielle De Brouwer, who was sitting out as she was recovering from a knee injury gained earlier in the season, had to go on for Joan’s final bout. Despite everything the foil team maintained their lead to win the foil. Finally in the sabre Hannah was joined by Clare Harding and Beth Jelfs. The sabre proved to be a much more straightforward win for the sabre team, who took the lead from first bout and maintained it throughout. With a final score of 128-93 the Imperial team were through to the final.

With Oxford having won their semi-final, the final was looked set to be a close match. The teams had already faced each other twice in the premiership league matches and had a win a piece. Starting this time with the foil, the injured Joan sat out with Gabrielle replacing her. Unfortunately with two extremely strong foilists (including one due to go to the world championships in a few weeks) in the Oxford team, the foil team lost the 30-45. The sabre followed, with an unchanged team from the semi-final. Again the sabre went without any problems winning 45-27. This gave a lead of 3 hits going into the epee. During the break between matches, Clare and Beth had tried their hand at epee. Emily adjudicated that Clare was the least bad of the two but that if Joan could in any way move she was still better than both. Joan made it through her first bout before she was forced to withdraw and Clare had to substitute for her, making a valiant attempt in her first ever epee match. The match remained close throughout, with everyone on the edge of their seats. Unfortunately despite everyone’s best efforts the Oxford team took the epee 45-40 giving them an overall lead of two hits 117-115. Despite the frustration of having come so close in the final, this was a fantastic end to the season which saw the Imperial women’s team lose to only one team throughout the year and gain the silver medals in the team championship. All that was left was to head to the BUCS party to see if Emily could win the chance to dance with Austin Healey.

Foils drawn, under the gaze of the mid-afternoon sun, IC Fencing novices strode confidently into competition against London’s finest at the ULU Novice Foil Fencing competition. For some their first competition lay ahead, and for others, the experienced, their second. In the heat of a match none of this matters. No nerves, no fear. The mind focuses not on the dripping sweat and aching muscles, nor the weary eyes, but on the flood of memories from past training sessions, evaluating the next move, the pre-emptive strike. What followed by the teams, Imperial Tequila and Mojito, was a display of pure determination and skill.

Both teams eased to early victories in the often tricky opening match, defeating both UCL second and third teams, with impressive scores of 45-27 (Tequila) and 45-32 (Mojito). Imperial Mojito continued to put in a strong performance against UCL first, but eventually succumbed to pressure against a very strong UCL team.

Imperial Tequila’s second match versus Kings was not so clear cut. An evenly matched and intensely fought struggle led to a 44-44 deadlock. All eyes watched on intently as the competitors took their positions. In a display of their skill and confidence, Imperial Tequila took victory. Cheering ensued.

Giving firm opposition, both teams lost their third matches against the two strongest sides in the competition, with Tequila losing to UCL1 and Mojito losing to ULU a close 45-37. Mojito put up a strong performance against the Kings team which gave Tequila such trouble, winning 45-38, an excellent result.

The competition closed with what some claim to be the only match of the competition, the Imperial Tequila-Mojito showdown. The outcome of this match was all important for the final standings of the contest, with a medal position at stake. A closely battled, and needless to say heated match once again came down to one point. The weight of team pride on their already weary shoulders tortured the mind. Imperial Mojito overcame the pressure to win a well deserved final point.

With their victory Mojito took an overall third place in the competition, awarded bronze medal for a fantastic performance on the day. All involved gave impressive displays, a sign of a strong future for IC Fencing club.

Celebrations were short lived however, with post competition drinks at the union. Penalties for the day’s events were delivered by a multitude of shots from the infamous epee guard, penalties for a low overall score, high score, or anything else the team could come up with. The excellent performances of the day soon disappeared from memory.