The clubs youngsters shine at Newcastle
Great fencing this weekend from our younger fencers. At the Newcastle U11 Leon Paul Junior Series, Arthur Eakin came 7th, while regular guest fencer Ethan Dakin, who competes for Sheffield Buccaneers, won bronze.
Arthur had a tough first poule, with gold medallist Calum Penman of Salle Holyrood and his first ever international opponent, from Dublin. He lost to both but put up a good fight and won comfortably against opponents from Scotland and two from a smart London prep school (Sussex House). Meanwhile, Ethan won all his fights, with a particularly pleasing 5-2 win over Calum Evans, the other bronze medallist.
In his second poule, Arthur faced Calum Penman and Calum Evans and lost those two fights, but again comfortably won his fights against opponents from Scotland, Herefordshire and Sussex House, leaving him as 7th seed for the DEs. Ethan again won all his matches (including a 5-2 win over local fencer Finlay Maclachlan of Radcliffe Sword), putting him as 2nd seed.
Arthur beat Caspian Lee, from Sussex House, in L16 and Ethan beat Nathan Brown, from Scotland. That meant the boys faced each other in L8. Ethan had to step up the gas considerably against Arthur but pulled through, leaving him to face Ben Turner of London's ZFW in the semi-final. Turner (who had knocked out Arthur in the English Youth Championships) prevailed against Ethan. Some great fencing from both boys, with Arthur trying out some new moves that he'd been practising in training and Ethan pulling out the stops when he needed to.
