In a recent article in the New York Times, Trip Advisor CEO Stephen Kaufer briefly glossed over the virtues fencing had instilled in him. “In fencing, you have to think three moves ahead. It turned out to be good training for corporate life,” Kaufer said.

Stephen Kaufer

While fencing itself was not the central focus of Kaufer’s article, his truthful words spurred my thinking as to ways in which the principles of fencing do translate to the world of modern business. In his latest in theWashington Times, Coach Damien Lehfeldt discusses how fencing has carried over to his career in business. These include:

• Ability to remain calm
• Ability to overcome adversity
• Ability to adapt to cultural norms
• Ability to prepare (or be slapped around like a disobedient puppy)

You can read the full article on the Washington Times Communities Page.

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12744/seven-principles-of-fencing-that-translate-to-the-business-world/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

De Ranglijsten van 17-2-2013 staan nu op de Ranglijst pagina

Deze ranglijsten worden gebruikt voor kwalificatie voor het WK Cadetten en Junioren 2013

De KNAS-Cupstanden zijn te vinden op de KNAS-Cup pagina

KNAS Ranglijsten

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van KNAS Nieuws: http://www.knas.nl/node/2166.

Dit artikel is geschreven door KNAS Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

2e prijs World Press Photo 2013

Op 15 februari zijn de winnaars bekend gemaakt van de World Press Photo 2013.

In de categorie Sport is de tweede prijs gewonnnen door Sergei Ilnitsky. Hij legde een schermactie vast tussen Alaaeldin Abouelkassem (Egypte) en Peter Joppich (Duitsland) tijdens de Olympische Spelen in Londen.

De winnende foto’s zijn vanaf 26 april tot 23 juni te zien in de Oude Kerk in Amsterdam. Daarna gaat de expositie de wereld rond.

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van KNAS Nieuws: http://www.knas.nl/node/2163.

Dit artikel is geschreven door KNAS Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

Wrestling is out of the 2020 Olympics but already fighting to get back in.

2020 Olympics: Why Fencing is Okay

The sports world got a major shock this week when the IOC announced that it was cutting wrestling from the “core 25″ sports of the 2020 Olympic Games. Wrestling looks to be out of the Games as the sport must re-apply for one open slot, but the IOC is looking to add a new sport to the Olympic program.

What is especially surprising is wrestling’s history at the Olympics. Wrestling was one of the original sports in the modern Olympic Games as well as a sport from the ancient Olympics. The IOC’s move serves notice that no sport is truly safe from being cut.

Wrestling will now join seven other sports in applying for inclusion in 2020. The others are a combined bid from baseball and softball, karate, squash, roller sports, sport climbing, wakeboarding and wushu. They will be vying for a single opening in 2020.

For the past few Olympic cycles, fencing has been one of the sports talked about as being under the gun and under threat of being cut by the IOC.

Why did wrestling get cut but fencing remains somewhat safe?

The International Fencing Federation (FIE) under Rene Roch had been working on tweaks to fencing’s presentation and format for a number of years to make the sport more media friendly. Fencing has spent a long time playing defense with regards to Olympic positioning and made a number of plays including actively responding to negative PR events with positive changes to the sport. Here are a few of the changes that we’ve identified:

Adding Women’s Sabre:

In a move to improve gender parity in the sport, the FIE added women’s sabre to the Olympic program in 2004. This move was controversial because the IOC did not add any medals, causing women’s foil AND women’s epee to both lose their team events at the 2004 Games. Since then the FIE has changed to rotation to be one men’s and one women’s discipline.

Video Replay:

The 2004 Olympic Games Men’s Team Foil event saw a referee controversy when the referee awarded several points for Italy over China that, on review by the FIE, should have gone the other way. The FIE determined that the calls were so bad that they disciplined the referee. This was a horrible PR event for fencing as it highlighted that the judging of points was not objective and possibly subject to cheating.

Fast-forward to 2008 and the FIE has instituted video replay for the Olympics. In their press conference before the Games, FIE President Rene Roch said that the use of new technologies will help make the judging fairer. He said there used to be complaints on the judges’ decisions, but the new video system will significantly reduce such complaints.

The IOC lauded fencing’s use of video replay. If nothing else, it adds to the perception of objectivity in the sport.

Other combat sports, including wrestling, face problems of referee interpretation of the actions for scoring. As these are combat sports and not “art” sports (like gymnastics and skating), the obscure judging hurts perceptions of the sport and is something that that IOC is looking at.

Zonal Points and Zonal Qualifications:

Fencing insiders have griped about the zonal system ever since it was put in place. In a move to promote fencing as a world-wide sport and not a euro-centric sport, the FIE set up zonal championships to award FIE points at events limited to fencers from specific regions. The regions match up with the Olympic zones: Europe, Asia + Oceana, Africa, and the Americas.

In addition there are zonal qualification tournaments at the end of the Olympic qualifying cycle to give smaller nations a shot by entering their best fencer as a last chance to get into the Games.

The FIE’s reason for these moves was to give more chances to different countries and regions for Olympic glory. If you look at FIE press releases from the world championships leading up to the 2012 Games, as well as the 2012 Games coverage, you’ll notice a great deal of ink spent lauding the accomplishments of the non-European nations.

The FIE struck PR gold and earned points with the IOC when Ruben Limardo (VEN) won Olympic Gold in Men’s Epee facing off against Bartosz Piasecki (NOR). Limardo won Venezuela’s first gold medal since 1968 and Piasecki had entered the 2012 Games via the “wild card” process that is the zonal qualifiers. In addition fencing saw its first African medalist when Alaaeldin Abouelkassem (EGY) won silver in Men’s Foil.

Here you go IOC, a global sport where not only does everyone have a shot at playing, but they’ve got a shot at winning too.

Fencing added dramatic lighting that left no doubt if a touch hit. (Photo: Craig Harkins)

Wireless Fencing, Visor Masks, and Stagecraft

Limardo (VEN), right, celebrates his semi-final victory.

We’ll lump all of these into the same overall category of “visual appeal.” This started out with visor masks, derided by fencing purists, but loved by some media outlets.

The wireless systems were another nod to problems broadcasters had with wired fencing – have you really listened to the noise the reel cables make when two epee fencers are bouncing through an entire DE match? One unexpected benefit to the wireless system was the freedom it gave to the fencers to really celebrate the winning touch. Really, could Limardo have shown as much emotion tied down to a leash at the end of the strip?

The staging of the 2011 World Championships led into even better staging for the 2012 Games. Leon Paul provided a strip lighting system that made fencing look like a retro video game by lighting up not only the fencer, but their side of the piste when there was a score.

Media-types and casual viewers alike gushed over the displays. The Olympics is fencing’s “Greatest Show”, and the lighting came up to the task.

Is fencing out of the woods?

Shin A Lam stranded on strip after a last second loss. (Photo: S.Timacheff)

It would be nice to think that fencing’s problems are all behind it, but with what happened to wrestling, we know that no sport is safe. Though fencing has taken great strides over the past two Olympic cycles, it still had the horrible ending to the Shin A Lam / Heidemann bout to work through. That it took officials on-site well over an hour to come to a conclusion and final ruling was bad, that there was a delay in getting a unified front together in explaining it all to the press was worse. At the end of it all, however, fencing got a ton of press and the FIE now knows of one more thing that it will have to address with potential rules and procedure changes before Rio.

What do you think? Should wrestling have gotten the axe? Is fencing safe? What does fencing need to do to insure its Olympic longevity?

2020 Olympics

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12655/2020-olympics-why-fencing-is-okay/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

China continued winning in the team event and placed 3 fencers in the individual top-8. (file photo: S.Timacheff)

Russia’s Yana Zvereva came out of nowhere to win the Sparkassen-Weltcup Women’s Epee World Cup in Leipzig, Germany. The Russian, ranked 106th at the end of last season, started out the top-64 knocking off 11th seed Maya Lawrence (USA) 12-6 and kept on winning.

In the top-8 Zvereva won a 3-2 bout over Johanna Bergdahl (SWE) and then knocked out #1 seed Sun Yujie (CHN), 15-10.

The US fielded 8 competitors with varied results. Olympic medalists Maya Lawrence and Courtney Hurley both maintained world rankings to bye into their direct elimination rounds, while their teammates Lindsay Campbell and Kelly Hurley put up 5-1 and 3-3 results respectively in the preliminary pools. Also in pools, Natalie Vie scored 5 victories in pools as well to be seeded near the top of fencers who competed in the pool round. Francesca Bassa and Isis Washington both made the cut with 2 victories, while Eleanor Leighton did not advance.

While Campbell and Vie’s performances were good enough to score them byes in the 128, only Washington joined top ranked fencers Lawrence and Courtney Hurley in the round of 64. Lawrence took a tough loss to 53^rd ranked Yana Zvereva of Russia who went on to take the gold medal, while Washington’s loss came to Sun Yujie of China who took home the bronze.

Courtney Hurley went on win 3 consecutive elimination bouts to make the top 8 at the event, where she lost 11-15 to Irina Embrich of Estonia.

China made the best showing of the weekend, placing 3 athletes in the final 8 of the individual event and winning the team event with a 25-22 victory over Hungary in the team finals.

In the team event, team USA was seeded third to bye into the top 16 where they lost to Hungary 44-36. In the placement rounds, they defeated Hong Kong, but lost close matches to Estonia and Germany.

Top-8: Leipzig Women’s Epee World Cup

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12645/leipzig-womens-epee/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

The Villa de Madrid treated its hosts well with individual gold and an upset in team.

Spain took the idea of a home court advantage to heart as Fernando Casares won the individual title and Spain knocked off the top seed in the team event at the Villa de Madrid.

The Villa de Madrid Men’s Saber World Cup was something of a mixed bag this year. The event was lacking a few familiar faces as countries are trying out some of their younger athletes to determine who looks good for the Rio Olympic Cycle, plus some athletes took the event off due to injuries.

Noteworthy absences included Aldo Montano (ITA), Rares Dumitrescu (ROU), Alexei Yakimenko (RUS), and 2012′s Olympic Bronze Medalist Nikolay Kovalev (RUS).

Despite the absence of some of last season’s top athletes, the final 8 of the event was mostly the usual suspects. France’s Bolade Apithy and Max Hartung of Germany took 7th and 8th. Our own Daryl Homer took down his third consecutive 6th place finish (Following finishes in Plovdiv and London) and 2012 Olympic silver medalist Diego Occhiuzzi (ITA) took 5th. Nicolas Limbach (GER), and reigning Olympic Gold Medalist Aron Szilagyi (HUN) split bronze.

Veniamin Reshetnikov (RUS), currently ranked 9th in the world, filled in for the absent Kovalev and Yakimenko admirably – bringing home the silver.

Madrid’s gold medalist – the real upset of the event – was won by Fernando Casares of Spain, stepping into the top-8 for the first time since a 5th place finish in 2009. After finishing the 2011/2012 season ranked 106th, Casares battled his way past Olympic silver and gold medalists Occhiuzzi and Szilagyi, before confronting Reshetnikov in the final and, ultimately, winning gold 15-9.

Watch the Gold Medal Bout here:

Quarter-Final Bouts:

Szilagyi (HUN) def. Apithy (FRA): 15-11
Casares (ESP) def. Occhiuzzi (ITA): 15-13
Reshetnikov (RUS) def. Homer (USA): 15-11
Limbach (GER) def. Hartung (GER): 15-14.

Semi-Finals:
Casares (ESP) def. Szilagyi (HUN): 15-14
Reshetnikov (RUS) def. Limbach (GER): 15-12

Gold:
Casares (ESP) dev. Reshetnikov (RUS): 15-9

Team Event

In the team event, Spain continued to get a home town bounce as they knocked out top seeded Russia 45-41 in the opening round of the team event. This paved the way for 9th seed Hungary, who seized on the opening by taking down Spain 45-29 and then went on to defeat Germany (45-33) and China (45-31) to win the team gold.

The United States came in as 7th seed and won their first round match vs. Canada 45-28. The US then lost to #2 Romania 45-42. In the placement rounds, the US defeated Ukraine 45-40 and then ended at 6th place when Italy won out 45-37.

Final Standings: Madrid Team World Cup

Final Standings: Villa de Madrid Individual Men’s Sabre

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12634/spain-scores-upsets-in-madrid/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

Inna Deriglazova won the women’s foil world cup in Budapest.

Russia has a strong showing in the individual event and Italy takes down the team title.

Arianna Errigo (ITA) entered as the #1 seed but had to be content with 3rd place at the Budapest Women’s Foil World Cup. Errigo retained her #1 world ranking. She fought her way to the semi-finals where she fell to eventual champion Inna Deriglazova (RUS), pictured left, 15-13.

Deriglazova defeated her teammate Larisa Korobeynikova (RUS) 15-13 in the finals.

The top-8 featured several upset-minded foilists as #67 Anita Blaze (FRA) made her way to the top-8 before losing to 19th seed Korobeynikova.

Only two of the top-8 seeds (Errigo and Deriglazova) survived to the quarter-finals.

Russia had the strongest individual showing overall with 3 fencers in the final-8 and an all-Russia championship match. France and Italy each placed two fencers in the top-8.

The top showing for the United States was Nicole Ross, who entered the event as the 16th seed. She won her first elimination match against Olena Khismatulina (UKR) 12-3 and then fell in the next round to Viktoria Kozyreva (RUS) 15-13. Ross finished 21st.

The upset of the day was Elisa Di Francisca, the 2012 Olympic Gold Medalist fell in the round of 32 to Gabriella Varga (HUN) 15-10 to finish 17th. This is Di Francisca’s worst finish since a 17th place result in March 2012.

This event did not do much to change the top of the world rankings. The top 3 slot remain with Italy (Errigo, Di Francisca, and Vezzali).

Di Francisca (ITA) failed to medal in the individual, but fenced for gold in the team event.

Team Event

In the team event, Italy shined with a 45-34 victory over France in the finals to take the event. Russia, despite a strong individual showing, fell in the quarter finals 29-28 to Germany. Italy put forward a team of Errigo, Di Francisca, Ilaria Salvatori, and Alice Volpi

Italy took the #1 seed and ran with it, dispatching Hungary 45-38 then Poland 45-25 before their final match with France.

France opened the day by defeating China 45-30 and then crushed Germany 45-19.

The United States lost their quarter final match against Poland 41-26. In the placement rounds the US lost 45-34 to Hungary and then defeated China 45-26 to take 7th place.

Individual Results (Top-8) Budapest Women’s Foil World Cup

FIE Women’s Foil: Team World Rankings (2/11/2013)

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12618/deriglazova-wins-in-budapest/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

In Berlijn is dit weekend voor de 53e keer het prestigieuze heren degen toernooi “Weiße Bär” georganiseerd. Maar liefst 260 schermers uit 28 landen namen deel aan dit tweedaagse evenement.

Tristan Tulen (1991) heeft hier een prachtige prestatie neergezet door in dit sterke deelnemersveld het brons te verdienen. Na een moeizame eerste dag waar Tristan zich als 63e plaatste voor het hoofdtoernooi trof hij zijn trainingsmaat Bas Verwijlen, die na een ongeslagen kwalificatiedag op de 2e plaats van het tableau stond. Na Bas overwonnen te hebben met 15-12, was de sterke Est Allika aan de beurt om met een zelfde uitslag te worden verslagen. Bij de laatste 16 ontmoette Tristan de zoon van de Duitse bondscoach, Rudolf Haller, die hij met 15-5 elimineerde. Bij het tableau van de laatste 8 stond verrassend de Fin Seeve klaar om Tristan van de halve finale af te houden. In een spannende partij versloeg Tristan de Fin met 15-13.

De halve finale vond plaats op een historische plek (zie foto hierboven). Tristan kwam uit tegen de Fransman Alex Fava. Het was in een prachtige partij waarbij Tristan nipt verloor met 15-13. De eerste plaats ging naar Jorg Fiedler die als titelverdediger Fava in de finale versloeg.

Met dit recente resultaat, voert Tristan nu de Europese U23 ranglijst aan met 44 punten.

Van harte gefeliciteerd Tristan en trainer Roel !

foto’s zijn aangeleverd door SC Den-Bosch.

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van KNAS Nieuws: http://www.knas.nl/node/2161.

Dit artikel is geschreven door KNAS Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

Het NK Veteranen 2013 werd gehouden in het weekend van 9 en 10 februari 2013 in Nijmegen.

Mede-organisator was de Nijmeegse Schermverening De Drie Musketiers

Locatie
Sporthal de Zwaluw , Zwaluwstraat 200 , 6541 NP Nijmegen,

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van KNAS Nieuws: http://www.knas.nl/node/2160.

Dit artikel is geschreven door KNAS Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!

I’ve started digging through a host of analytics data that shows me what questions people are asking when they come to Fencing.Net. With that in mind, I’ve started up this new section for frequently asked questions (FAQs).

Over the next several weeks (and maybe months), we’ll be going over the search data we have on what questions people are asking when they hit the site. For those we’ll either write up a new posting, or refresh an older post that already does a good job answering the question. If you have a fencing-related question that you’d like us to answer, then please shoot that via email to webmaster@fencing.net and we’ll send you the answer as well as a link to the page if we publish your question.

Today’s question: How Long is a Fencing Sword?

Answer: The maximum length for a foil or epee is 110 centimeters (about 43.3 inches.) The maximum length for a fencing sabre is 105 centimeters (about 41.33 inches).

Longer answer (with background and references!):

Foils, epees, and sabres.

In the sport of fencing there are standards for each weapon – foil, epee, and sabre – to make a level playing field for the athletes.

Since we are trying to hit the target with our fencing sword, a longer blade can give an advantage over an athlete with a shorter blade. Because of this, there are maximum lengths for both the blade and the overall foil, epee, and sabre.

The maximum blade length is the length of the blade measured from the bell guard to the tip of the weapon. There are different rules for each of the weapons, though foil and epee share the maximum lengths for the total fencing sword as well as the blade.

When reviewing the rules about the length, keep the following in mind:

The overall length takes into account the bell-guard and grip. The measurement is taken from the end of the tip to the end of the pommel or grip, whichever is longer.

• The blade is measured from the bell-guard to the tip.
• There are also maximum sizes for the bellguards, as those provide protection from hits as well.
• The overall lengths are set forth in the official international rules in metric lengths:

In foil and epee:

Length of a complete epee from the rulebook. (via USA Fencing rules)

The maximum length of the blade is 90 cm

The maximum length of the foil or epee is 110cm

In sabre:

The maximum length of the sabre is 105cm

The maximum length of the sabre blade is 88cm

For additional rules about the size of the bell-guards, grips, as well as some illustrations you can use for guidance, please refer to Refer to m.3 of the rules. (FencingOfficials.org has download links to the current USA Fencing rulebook in various formats. Here is the link to the pdf format.)

OK. So what is a size 5 fencing blade?

Short answer: A size 5 blade is the standard, maximum length, fencing blade.

Fencing equipment suppliers designate shorter blades as size “2″ or “0″ to reference their shorter length. The only age group in USA Fencing that is not allowed to use a full sized fencing blade is the Y10 age group.

Longer answer:

a whole bunch of fencing blades

Fencing blades used to be widely available in sizes from “0″ to “5″ with a size “5″ blade being the maximum legal length. A “size 5″ blade will be the maximum length allowed, 90cm for foil and epee, 88cm for sabre.  This measures to approx 35.4 inches in foil and epee and 34.6 inches in sabre.

Today, the main lengths that are commercially available are the size “5″ and size “2″. Some fencing clubs provide size “0″ blades for their youth classes.

For USA Fencing Youth competitions, there is a shorter maximum blade size for Y10 (Under 10) age group events:

1. The maximum blade length permitted for Youth-10 competitions is 32.5
inches. (See Athlete’s Handbook, Section 2.6 and Materials Rules m.3). Parents
and fencers are advised that blades marketed as “#0” or “#2” blades are believed
to meet this requirement. Blades marketed as #0 or #2 blades that are longer
than 32.5 inches, though, are not permitted.

2. There are no special rules regarding the maximum blade length for Youth-12
and Youth-14 events. Blades must still comply with weapon-specific maximum
blade lengths (see Materials Rules m.3, m.8, m.16, m.23)

Typically, this means that for Y10 events you’ll have “Size 2″ blades as those are the marketing designation for the blades that are allowed for fencing in the Y10 events. There is no overall governing body for marking blade sizes onto the blades, so keep in mind the guidance from the USA Fencing officials that it is the actual blade length, not the marked length, that applies.

Dit artikel is overgenomen van de website van Fencing.net Nieuws: http://www.fencing.net/12604/faq-how-long-is-a-fencing-sword/.

Dit artikel is geschreven door Fencing.net Nieuws van Schermsport.NL - Hét portaal voor de Nederlandse schermsport!