FENCING – The Orange and Black

By Maria Kuklina

Have you ever heard of the sport “Fencing”? Well, it is much more than just a rare sport. In this article, you will learn abundant facts about this amazing sport, and what it takes to be good at this sport. You will also learn about different athletes that play this sport. I hope you enjoy!

What is FENCING?

So, you read the introduction and you think you are interested in this topic. You might even want to try it! But, in this section of this article you will learn about the rules and different types of fencing. So, let’s get started!

Fencing is a hard sport that requires a lot of balance, coordination, speed, quick thinking and fast reaction time. You need to be able to know what your opponent is doing and react to that, or else they will hit you. Fencing really takes stick sword fighting to the next level! This might seem really hard, but everyone starts with the same 4 moves. The en garde position, the lunge where you extend your arm at your opponent and launch forward, the retreat where you move backward, and the advance where you move forward.

The “En garde” position. (1st picture) The lunge. (2nd picture) The advance and retreat. (3rd picture)

When you have those four down, you can pretty much fence comfortably. There is also a bunch of bladework (sword techniques you need to learn) that you do, but you really just need to make something up when you’re fencing. You don’t have a lot of time to think, you have less than a second to decide whether you should attack or defend. But you’ll get better at this once you fence more. As you try harder and progress, you might even win first place! You might even travel to faraway places, like Egypt where fencing originated. So, if you’re still interested, this might be the sport for you!

THE PROS AND CONS OF FENCING

I am writing this as a person with 2 years of experience fencing, but people that have more years of experience might say otherwise. Let’s start with the pros.

First off, fencing is great exercise. You can burn lots of calories and it makes your legs, arms, and core stronger. You can get faster reaction time and you will be able to think faster and more easily under pressure. Fencing is a sport usually played 1v1, but there are also teams. I chose fencing because you are just going solo, and you won’t be humiliated by your teammates like in basketball or soccer if you lose. Of course, I’ve never played basketball or soccer, so I might be wrong.

Now let’s do the cons.

The cons of fencing aren’t that bad in my opinion. You can get bruises and big cuts, only if people hit you in the legs or arms. The torso doesn’t hurt that bad when your opponent hits you, because you have layers of protection. A chest protector, underarm protector, jacket, and lame.

You’ll learn about those later. Another con of fencing is the cost, because you can’t keep borrowing gear from your fencing club. You need to buy fencing pants, separate shoes for fencing, protection gear, and at LEAST three swords in case one breaks. Oh, and you also need a body chord and a mask chord. And that costs a LOT of money. A fencing sword costs around $100 (Look it up.) So, that’s a pretty big con of fencing. A lot of families can’t afford it. My family is the average family, and we can afford it. But there are different types of average for different families. If you think you can afford fencing, congrats! You might have found yourself a new sport! And if you can’t afford it, no worries! You can borrow gear from your fencing club! (But not for long) You can buy things on sale, or take it slow, buying items one at a time. The most important thing is that you get to fence, and it doesn’t matter what gear you’re wearing.

Fencing Gear

Fencing gear can cost over 2500 dollars if you’re not a competitive fencer. If you travel and are fencing competitively, then it can cost over 20000! That’s a lot of money! This is because you constantly have to replace your gear if it breaks or mysteriously stops working. If you’re interested in what gear you need, this is where to look.

Fencing gear has lots of things to buy, from shoes to blades. Here you will learn lots about gear you need. First off, fencing clubs hate outside shoes in their fencing area, and I’m not sure why. You need your own shoes just for fencing. Next, you need some fencing pants. These pants are thick, so if you get hit in the leg it won’t hurt as much as if you were hit in leggings. You can also wear baggy pants and keep your fencing pants strictly for competitions so they don’t get dirty. Now, on to the protection gear. First, you need a chest protector in order to fence. If you don’t have one, you would just have 3 layers of fabric protecting you from the blade. It is a very important item to wear when you’re fencing so you don’t get hurt.

Next, the underarm protector. This piece of protective clothing basically goes around the arm you fence. It’s like a half t-shirt. Then, you need a body cord. I’ll try to describe how to do this in words, but it’s much easier if you actually SEE how to put it on. You hold the small plug side in your fencing hand, and you put on your jacket, which is a long sleeved thick jacket, and then your lame which is like the jacket but it has no arm protection (If you fence foil. If you fence sabre, the lame goes over your arms. You’ll learn about this later.) It is also made out of little gray electrical… things that register the touch if someone hits you. This only works with the bodycord. Also, you get little splinters from the electrical things sometimes. After you finish putting on your gear, you need to clip the metal clip to your lame. It doesn’t matter where you clip it, as long as it doesn’t fall off. Put on your glove, then you get your blade and plug in the small plug of the body cord. Lastly, put on your mask and clip the mask cord to your mask and the back of your lame. Your coach can help you with this. And that’s it! Now you can fence without worrying about getting hurt.

PICTURES AND PRICES

You also will need tape for the tip of your blade. This helps your blade register the touch more easily and efficiently.

TYPES OF FENCING

There are three types of fencing: Sabre, Foil, and Epee. I do foil, and it is considered the safest type of fencing. In foil you can only hit in the chest, where your chest protector is. Sabre, for me, is extremely reckless. Whenever I’m watching fencing, all I see is two people slashing their blades around in different directions. So, getting hit must really hurt. Also, in Sabre, you can only hit in the chest and arms. And trust me, it really hurts when you get hit in the arms, because there is no protection of the arms. It’s literally just two pieces of fabric.

Epee is also reckless, but my dad used to do it. He said that the epee weighs more than the sabre and foil, which proves that it is the slowest form of fencing. Foil weighs a maximum of about 500 grams, and sabre weighs also about 500 grams, and the epee weighs 750 grams. It might not seem like much of a difference, and it might not seem like they’re really heavy, but trust me, when you’re a beginner your arm isn’t used to holding a sword, so it gets tired. Also, in epee you can literally hit anywhere. Yup, anywhere. In the mask, the shoes, the legs, the arms, anywhere! So you must get a LOT of bruises from this type of fencing.

But I’ll leave the decision up to you. Fencing is really a beautiful sport, and each weapon type has its own pros and cons. But no matter what weapon you do, you still do the en garde position, advance, retreat, and lunge.

MY EXPERIENCE

My experience fencing has been a really fun experience. I’ve been fencing since I was nine years old. (I’m 12) I have won two gold medals, but no silver and no bronze! And I have gotten a lot of bruises and injuries from this sport. But I love it, no matter what injuries I get. I remember one of my friends quit fencing as a beginner because someone hit her on the knee. Me, on the other hand, I didn’t quit when I got a huge scar on my elbow and a giant bruise on my thigh. Also, I have been to Ohio, New Jersey twice, and New York twice for Nationals and Regionals. I love traveling with fencing, because I get to feel famous and stay in hotels. Sometimes I feel really tired fencing at nationals, but I always try my best, no matter what.

Here is my fencing club:

https://www.starfencingacademy.com

These are other clubs:

https://www.vivofencingclub.com

https://www.marxfencingacademy.com

https://www.bostonfencingclub.org