December 2016, Emily & I were chasing the Northern Lights on a holiday in Iceland when I asked her to marry me. While the aurora borealis might have escaped us, she said yes. We had to wait to set the date, I didn’t want any clashes with the European or World Championships but following the publication of the international fencing calendar a suitable date was found and the challenge of finding a venue was next.
Prior to the 1989 Senior World Championships being held in Chicago, all firms pitching to supply the apparatus for this event were invited to a National circuit competition in Chicago to trial their F.I.E. approved sabre apparatus.
Every fencer has it: a personal collection of special moments. A day you'll remember. A match ended with a close win. A competition that leaves not just medals, but memories.
For Leon Paul sponsored fencer Bas Verwijlen the 2018 edition of Challenge SNCF Réseau in Paris, one of the most important events of the worldcup series in Men's epee, does definitely belong to that category of unforgettable experiences. Read on for his full report about his day and how he made it to the podium.
Following a seamless journey to Copenhagen via Heathrow, Francine Robb and myself boarded the train to Gentofte where this season's Copenhagen Cadet Epee EFC tournament was taking place. We had been asked by our friends at the Hellerup Club to head up the DT for 6th edition of this fabulous event.
With only 12 places available in my event, to qualify for the 2016 Paralympic Games I had to either win direct qualifiers Zonal/World Championships or rank within the top 6 of the world rankings after the automatic and host nation places had been awarded. The qualifying period for this ran from Sept 2014 - May 2016 and I was thrilled to secure an early lead in the rankings, winning GB's first Wheelchair fencing World Cup Gold in the first event and going on to complete a hat-trick in the next two events.
This is a short post to show our appreciation for the guys at the Fencing Podcast, who are celebrating their first year in the business of all things fencing.
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We pride ourselves in always pushing the sport of fencing forwards and at the 2017 World Championships in Leipzig we wanted to show something really special. Ben calls it the moonshot piste, something that can once again transform the presentation of the sport. It is not until you see the piste in person that you can appreciate how totally awesome it is.
A season's retreat
Gaining a title is never easy. In any sport, at any age class, at any time. To defend a title is, it is said, even more difficult. On March 23, 2016, I managed to win the title of the German B-Youth Champion at my first German Championships in Halle, Germany. It was a hard piece of work, but the feeling of triumph was worth all the hard training, sweat and pain. What I did not know by then was that it was only the beginning.
Text: Leander und Timo Helm
Videos: Timo Helm, Oliver Gröteke
Hungary
Ukraine
