Stress, sweat and a whole lot of swords: Warwick Fencing at the Cambridge Winter Tournament

Many people think of fencing as a rather romantic, gentlemanly sport of grace and precision. Whilst in many respects this is true, fencing competitions are rather different: you are welcomed with the stench of sweat amidst the shouts, squeaks of shoes and clash of swords; it’s not a quiet sport but a passionate one full of adrenaline.

If you don’t understand the format of a fencing competition here’s how it goes down: the three weapons (foil, sabre, epée) are split between men and women, so there are six separate events. Because of this, fencing competitions are normally run over a weekend to cover all the weapons for men and women.

Depending on the number of entrants, there are either one or two rounds of poules followed by direct eliminations based on your rankings after the poules. The poules are simple, as the first to score five hits wins. The ‘DE’s’ are more complicated, as it’s the first to 15 hits within the time limit of three lots of three minutes, with one minute breaks in between. The Sabre is different, with a minute break after the first eight hits because it’s so fast.

Rankings are decided by your percentage of victories and then your indicator as a separator; your indicator being the number of hits scored against you subtracted from the total number of hits you scored.

You would expect a competition to be hostile and competitive on and off the piste. On the contrary, it’s like one big family you only get to see twice a month. Everyone is there for each other – unless you’re Matt Rumble and you see your nemesis Julian Ghosh.

The Cambridge Winter Tournament took place on the weekend immediately before the start of term, where the Christmas spirit is usually fresh in peoples’ minds. Yet day one of the competition was full of stress and drama: John Wilson, the president of the Warwick Fencing Club, forgot to pack his breeches, while Matt Rumble managed to stink out the entire hall with his sabre lamé, which hadn’t been washed for god knows how long. He was seeded one place beneath his nemesis Julian Ghosh. But by far the most stress caused during the competition, including Calum Wilson winning the men’s sabre final (sorry Calum), was James Brosnan (a leftie) breaking three foils during the course of the competition. Fellow foilists were unsurprisingly reluctant to lend him their spare foils.

Image: Facebook/Warwick Fencing Club

Day two of the competition followed myself and Waltraud Baier in the women’s Épée. If you think the women’s is any less entertaining or noisy or smelly than the men’s, you’re sorely mistaken: it’s arguably louder and just as heated as the men’s’. You don’t want to cross paths with a female fencer with a sword in her hand.

Although I got knocked out in the first round of DE’s my seeding of 20th out of 29 was a personal best. Waltraud, meanwhile, was knocked out in the second round of DE’s, coming 14th. Épée requires patience, timing and precision as there is no priority and the whole body is the target; as such the matches are timed otherwise they could go on forever.

Despite all the drama from day one, the Cambridge Tournament was a thoroughly enjoyable experience and extremely well run, including extreme leniency over the broken foils. It was a fantastic performance from Warwick Fencing Club – definitely worthy of being a club to watch in 2017.

Image: Facebook/Warwick Fencing Club