Fencing.Net - Your Guide to Fencing & Fencing Equipment

It's a card, but it's a hard card to throw.

One has to be REALLY certain to even think about it. Even taking the fencers aside and verbally alerting them of your suspicions is an extraordinarily difficult proposition.

Especially if the fencers are even halfway competent about masking it.

Anecdote from when I was a collegiate fencer (I was at the tournament but did not witness this bout): At NCAA regionals two teammates (not my team) were fencing MF. One was a several-time All-American, the other.... wasn't that caliber.

Bout starts with 4 quick touches, all flicks by the All-American. 4-0.

The next 4-5 actions were the All-American basically standing there and letting his teammate score. 4-4.

One more quick flick and it was over. 5-4. The All-American made an off-handed comment to a friend from another team that his coach had said one should never beat a teammate by any other score.

That's about as blatent as one can get.

It did not draw a card. It certainly SHOULD have, but it didn't.

I've seen suspicious bouts before. I've seen bouts that looked suspicious but which I'm fairly certain were completely legit. I've seen bouts where a priori there was talk about the possibilities, and then the actual fencing left no question in anyone's mind but that they were completely legit. I've had people admit to me that they threw a bout. Or brag about how they were part of a conspiracy to ensure the "right" person won a tournament. It's rare in our sport, but it does happen.

Adding bodies to make tournaments higher classified isn't cheating. It's completely an artifact of our stupid classification system that eventually needs to get fixed, but it's not wrong.

Throwing bouts is. Done compentently, however, it's very hard to sanction other than through unofficial means such as peer pressure.

-B

Not that I'm saying you should have given the card, but throwing a bout is a black cardable offense. You can always remind the fencers of this if you suspect its going on.