Sharon Jones reports
This has been a very enjoyable three days for Fernwood Sword Club at the British Youth Championships at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield.
Ed was our only representative on Saturday in U18 men's foil, as three fencers who had qualified unfortunately had to withdraw for a variety of good reasons. He had a very international poule, winning all six fights - 5-0 against Michael Thompson of Northern Ireland, William Vestbirk of London and Finn Manning of South West, 5-1 against Ka Shing Kan of Hong Kong and Yorkshire and a very pleasing same score against strong Hungarian cadet and Northwest fencer, Adam Suha, finishing with a 5-3 over a bouncing Oscar Pickering of South East.
This placed Ed in equal first place for the DEs, but with a tableau where many of the most difficult fencers were in Ed's half. He had a bye to L32, where he comfortably defeated Joshua Bastille of South East 15-3. He had a very tough L16 match against difficult Hong Kong and Yorkshire fencer Long Ting Yung. Ed squeaked a 15-12 win last year against the same fencer after being 3-9 down. This year it was fairly even all the way through, but with a narrower win margin of 15-13. In L8, he faced Dan Summerfield of Eastern. Summerfield had dispatched significantly higher seeds in the two previous rounds with 15-14 wins, coming from behind each time. Ed took a lead but was careful not to make the same mistake, coming out with a 15-8 win. Ed's opponent in the semi-final was Sam Wilson of Southern, who called for arm judges early on the match as he said Ed was covering. However, the only calls by the arm judges were to give Wilson 2 red cards for his own infringements. The matches between these two fencers are always close, with Ed winning the last two by one point. It was even most of the way through, but Ed ran out of energy and Wilson won 15-11, going on to win a fairly one sided final 15-7, with Ed having to be satisfied with a bronze medal.
Day 2 started with Ed fencing in men's U18 sabre. His only competitive experience of sabre up till then was 12 matches to 5 points at the Cadet Winton in December and he has had very little more in the way of training matches. He acquitted himself very well in the poule, winning 3 and losing 3 matches, including one win against a GB cadet squad member, leading to some grumpy faces from experienced sabreurs. He had a bye to L32 and came up against a GB cadet squad member, Rohan Smith, of Marshall Fencing. The rules of priority in sabre are slightly different from those in foil and Ed's inexperience led to him losing priority in a number of instances. He took 6 points off Smith and finished in 18th place and in the top half of the overall ranking. He finished off the day's sabre with an unofficial fence off with the competition's other foilist, Michael Thompson of Northern Ireland. Ed squeaked a 15-13 win, though with another foilist refereeing, some of the calls may have been a bit suspect.
Fernwood's other competitor on Day 2 was Esme Halling, in the U14 women's foil. This was only Esme's second competition and she was extremely nervous all the way through the poule, which mean that she wasn't able to do herself justice. She picked up a number of points but no wins, meaning she had a tough DE against the 14th seed, Ruby Smith of North East. Esme went into the fight with commendable courage and fought well to pick up 7 points, She finished in 51st place, there or thereabouts with the final placings of the other three East Midlands fencers in the competition.
Arthur Eakin kicked off Day3 in U12 men's foil. He started with a strong 5-1 win against David Kelly of Scotland Central, who only dropped one other match. There followed a 5-0 win against George Edwards of West Midlands,a 5-1 win against Henry Burdge of South West and a 5-2 win against Rhys Turnbull of North East. He had a storming start against the very experienced Tomi Fric of Eastern, taking a 3-0 lead. Fric changed his tactics and pushed Arthur back, changing the game with 5 unchallenged points. Finally, Arthur faced the equally experienced Aarav Chaudhari in London (who finished in L8). Arthur didn't quite get the measure of him but the 1-5 scoreline wasn't entirely representative. Arthur faced Joshua Elsworth of Eastern in L64 and had a relatively comfortable 10-4 win. He fenced excellently in L32 against higher seeded Wilfred Houston-Brown of West Midlands. The lead see-sawed in the course of the match, but Arthur took the initiative late on and finished a 10-8 winner. He was then unfortunate to meet the eventual silver medallist, Callum Penman of Scotland East, who is an excellent fencer with a good sense of distance. He had Arthur on the back foot and came out a convincing winner. 15th place from 63 fencers in the BYCs is a super result - and with a slightly different tableau, a L8 place and medal would have been very achievable.
Last but not least, Julia Higgins was fencing in her first ever competition in the U16 women's foil (and in the younger of the two eligible years). She was certainly the least experienced competitor in the entire competition and many had considerably more experience. She started off with an excellent 4-2 win over Sarah Earl of North East and followed it up with a 4-3 win over Catherine Drescher of South East (who fenced in the Challenge Wratislava in Poland earlier this year, so is no novice). Julia then had four very tough matches; one of her opponents fences internationally in the GB Cadet squad and 2 others in the U15 England squad. This was a great learning experience, of course. Unfortunately, Drescher pulled out late in the poule, so Julia's win against her didn't count, which dropped her ranking for the DEs (and ultimately overall). She faced the higher seeded (and more experienced) Chloe Suen of Southern in L64. Julia put up a very spirited fight, taking 8 points off her opponent. She finished in 34th place overall, fenced very well indeed for a first competition and was unlucky not to make L32.
(Photo shows Ed with Duncan Morrison and Finlay McAndrew of Salle Holyrood in Edinburgh, who both made L8 in the U18 men's foil.)