Bulletin for the Week of Dec. 7, 2009

1. This will be the last bulletin until the new year. Happy holidays to all! This is the "bonus week" of fencing before the holiday break. Here is the schedule for this week:
Mon. 6:30-9, Tues 7:30-9:30: Free Try Epee class for those who have little to no epee experience. Get acquainted with the basics of epee. If you like epee, you are welcome to take the Level 2 class as an epee fencer. What's the difference? Epee is heavier, has no off-target (you can hit any part of your opponent's body) and no right of way rules (whoever hits first gets the point). Foil and epee attract different personalities. Foil puts a premium on initiative and aggressiveness. It has been likened to a game of chess (your turn, my turn) and to classical music (virtuosity within a structure). Epee puts a premium on patience and sneakiness. It has been likened to a game of poker (bluffing while trying to get your opponent to show his cards first) and to jazz (improvisation). If we have time, newbies will also get a chance to try a little sabre. I don't teach sabre, so if you really love it, you'll have to travel to out of state clinics to learn more, but I can at least acquaint you with the rules and basic moves.

Wed. 7-9 p.m. Bridge School. Open fencing. Everyone is invited, including this fall's level 1 and 2 students. No class or organized activity, just a chance to fence a bunch of people.

Thurs 7:30-9:30 p.m, Charlotte Central School. Annual VFA Holiday Party and Infamous Candy-Stealing Game! All fencers are encouraged to come to this, including Middlebury fencers (a lot of Charlotters came to your party last year) and Tuesday class students (level 1-2). Please bring a beverage and/or dessert to share (nothing too messy please-stuff that doesn't require forks or spoons is best). Club will provide paper cups and plates. Here's how the game works: When you arrive, you get a paper bag with your name on it. You start with a certain amount of candy, depending on your age and experience level. A-rated fencers get 1 piece, Bs get 2, Cs get 3, Ds get 4, Es get 5, unrated fencers get 6. You get a bonus piece if you are over 40 or under 13 years old. You get another bonus piece if you first started fencing in 2009. You get another bonus piece if you are a brilliant, witty individual who is a pleasure to be around (yes, that is the entire membership of the VFA, it goes without saying....). During the course of the evening, you fence 5-touch, non-electric bouts with as many different opponents as you can find. You may not fence the same person twice unless you have already fenced everyone else in the game. A challenge can not be refused. You may fence any weapon (loaners will be available). If you and your opponent can't agree which weapon to fence, the fencer who started with less candy gets to decide (play rock-paper-scissors if you started with the same amount). Bouts will be self-reffed. Be honorable in acknowledging touches, and if you and your opponent can't agree whose touch it was, don't count it. The loser of each bout must give the winner one piece of candy. Please do not eat your candy before the game is over (don't worry, nobody will be deprived of sugar). We will count up the candy in each player's bag at 9 p.m. for youth fencers and 9:15 for everyone else. There will be the traditional Humble Yet Symbolically Glorious prizes for the overall winner at the end, plus the best unrated fencer and the best youth (kid age 12 or younger).

2. If you plan to rent equipment this winter, don't forget to let me know as soon as possible. I am currently registering students for winter classes. So far, 6 new people have signed up in Charlotte (2 adults, 2 teens, and 2 children), but only 2 new students have registered in Middlebury (1 adult and 1 child). Middlebury fencers, we did a good job recruiting new members this fall (and 5 of them have already registered to return for winter classes), but we are not out of the woods yet in terms of building our numbers back up to our former glory. To continue as a thriving, viable club, we need to attract new members of all ages every term. So please make sure to spread the word to all your friends and encourage them to get in touch with me soon.

3. Next Champlain Cup tournament:

Sunday, Jan. 17, Hanover High School (NH). Foil-Epee Doubles and E Meet
9:30 a.m.: Foil-Epee Doubles.
12 p.m. E Foil.
2 p.m. E Epee

Foil-Epee Doubles is an annual GMD tradition. Here's how it works: enter with a partner, one foilist and one epeeist per team (no switching roles once underway). You and your partner do not have to belong to the same club. You get a $2 discount on your entry fee if your partner is your parent, child, spouse or sibling. You will fence relay matches against other teams. A relay works like this: a coin toss determines whether the foilists or epeeists fence first. They fence until one of them has 5 points (or 3 minutes elapses). Their partners then take over the score and fence until one team has 10 (so you can come from behind and win by scoring more than 5 points). Deb Hogan and I (a.k.a. Ladies With Swords) would like to issue a challenge to all teams!

E events are restricted to fencers rated E or unrated. As long as 15+ fencers show up, the winner will earn an D and the next 3 fencers an E. So if you are trying to earn your first rating, or improve from an E, this is the tournament for you. It's also a great first tournament for rookie competitors who would like the fun of fencing fellow less experienced competitors without the big guns to contend with.

For all events, USFA membership is required (you can join at the tournament that day), and all fencers must be born 1996 or earlier. You may enter as many events in this tournament as you want to, but they will almost certainly overlap, meaning that if you are in more than one, you will be expected to dash from strip to strip with little rest. If that sounds too tiring to you, you might want to limit yourself to 1 or 2 events.

To sign up for this tournament, go to
www.askfred.net/Events/whoIsComing.php?tournament_id=10399
Sign up for individual events the usual way (contact me if it's your first time and you need help figuring FRED out). To sign up for the doubles event, you will see an inconspicuous little link above the regular (individual event) preregistration page that says "Looking for Team Events?". Click on that. You will then get a form to enter the last names of your two team members (there is actually room for up to 4 team members, but leave the last two blank). When you hit continue, you will get a form which lets you select your team members from all the fencers in the FRED database with the same last name, and to name your team. Only one team member needs to sign up the team (talk to eachother and decide who will do it). Remember that being on a team is a commitment-if you don't show up, your partner can't fence.

4. Thank you to the Upper Valley Fencing Club for hosting the Holiday Open yesterday. It was a long day, but it was great to see such a big turnout, with a number of out of state visitors joining the usual GMD crew. Congratulations to all the finalists:

Open Foil (28 competitors, C2 event)
1. Ben Hogan, VFA
2. David Parker, VFA
3T. Ethan Yu, VFA
3T. Simone Feldman, Bay State FC
5. Viveka Fox, VFA
6. Ethan Miller, Seacoast FC
7. Jared Whalen, CVFC
8. Keegan Harris, SC

Open Epee (37 competitors, C2 event)
1. Joseph Oliverius, Nashville FA
2. Wyatt Moreton, FC
3T. Trevy Wing, Dartmouth
3T. Skyler Crossman, RIFRAF - earned D rating
5. Ethan Miller, Seacoast FC
6. Eliot Witten, Riverside FC
7. Zac Young, VFA
8. Killian Wade, RPI

Y12 Foil (21 competitors, born 1997 or later)
1. Abby Yu, VFA
2. Justin Ma, Wen FC
3T. Rowan Lovell, WSC
3T. Lloyd Staats, CVFC
5. David Horak, UVFC
6. Nick Pomicter, VFA
7. Nick Robbins, WSC
8. Toby Lanser, WSC

Y14 Epee (14 competitors, born 1995 or later)
1. Tommy Witten, Riverside FC
2. Sawyer Maher, Putnam County FC
3T. Gus Grosenbaugh, RIFAC
3T. Caroline Jones, VFA
5. Maxwell Hampton, RIFAC
6. Abby Yu, VFA

Performance of the Week: It's been a long time since we've seen Deb Hogan in competition, and yesterday she served notice that she's back. She took a season off to recover from a string of injuries, and then another season to let her son Chris establish himself as an epeeist without having to compete with her. But she didn't spend her time off from competition sitting at home eating fritos in front of the tv. Despite not competing, Deb was an active member of the club and division, reffing (including earning a high enough refs rating to officiate at national events), helping teach beginners, working on her own technique and tactics in practice, and remaining a constant, observative, inquisitive student of the game. Yesterday, she went 4-1 in her pool. I saw her beat one of the eventual, C-rated finalists, doing it with authority and a nice mix of actions. She won her first DE, before being narrowly upset by Zac in overtime in a drawn out defensive battle. She finished a respectable 11th of 37 in a strong field. Not bad for someone who is making a comeback now that she is finally old enough to be a veteran!

Honorable Mentions: How about those Yus? Ethan lost to me in pools because he was trying to overwhelm me withs peed instead of setting up correct actions. He definitely fixed that when we met in DEs, fencing a well-crafted bout in which he carefully selected his moments to attack early on, used a nice range of actions to surprise me, and then played a strong defensive game in the last period when I was forced to attack by time running out. Abby carved a wide swath through the Y12 field, but got a serious challenge in her gold medal bout, when all 3 encounters ended 5-4. At least in the tiebreaker match, when it was 4-4, she executed a clean 1-light action and made the ref's job easy. And how about those Pomicters? Maddy pulled off a hard-fought 15-14 win over one of her age group rivals, while Nick had his best effort yet in youth foil. Zac proved he is able to finish among the rated fencers in an open, and Zach fenced a very strong pool round. Ben and David are rapidly establishing themselves as the top contenders for this year's Champlain Cup awards, and their gold medal match was a close one. David took the lead with some excellent attacks in preparation, but Ben made a good distance adjustment to defend against those and come back to win 10-8. Hats off to Hunter, Josh and Alex for competing in their first ever tournament, and to Romaney for winning her first tournament bout.