Tournaments Listings Thought: Secondary Circuit

[Craig]

We all know that the official circuit for the US is the series of NACs. There also seems to be a growing "secondary" circuit of large events in the US that draw a significant number of in and out of region fencers.

What about a series of threads or pages that define and track this circuit? It could be a fun project and would definately highlight those tournaments to the fencing.net community.

The ones that I've seen a lot about and would think to include thus far are:

Duel in the Desert
Rose
Crescent City Open
Pomme

What others are there? Are there specific ones for other weapons (I'm thinking that one of the recurring Nellya tournaments would be a good one for the sabre circuit.)

Craig

[fencerontheline]

This is an excellent idea. Perhaps this is the best way to regionalize... by doing it on our own.


I'd include the Mr Ma Cup as well as any event that exceeds an A2 ranking..

[Craig]

Let's use this thread to generate the list and then try to make some weapon-specific lists as I'm sure there are some tournaments that cater to some weapon groups more than others.

Once we have a good list together I can talk to some of the tournament organizers about having some sort of fencing.net sponsored points list with at least bragging rights at the end of season.

Craig

[D+F+P=Hadouken!]

Phoenix open. Some of those texas tournaments also, like the longhorn open, and the pouj, and the Long beach invitational, in socal.

[oso97]

Several of the Texas events are already part of the Southwest Section Circuit Cup (SSCC), including the Longhorn and the Rose. Plus also the Oz Parsons, and rotating events in North Texas and Gulf Coast. The Crescent City used to be part of the SSCC (which helped grow the event substantually), but pulled out due to disagreements between the LA Division people and the other organizers about event compositions.

Long Beach Invitational and the Duel in the Desert are part of the Pacific Coast Section Circuit.

[CvilleFencer]

Great idea craig! I also agree with FotL that the best way to regionalize may be to do it ourselves. It might help to have a rough guide for criteria. I would suggest the following events, with this years numbers:

VA Kickoff Open: Foil B3 103 fencers / Epee A4 95 fencers / saber B2 32 fencers

DC Cherry Blossom Open: It is set up to odd to explain in a short post, but it had a total of 249 entries and you can get the details at: http://www.geocities.com/bdschenck/m...rmcity2005.htm

VA Hangover Open: It has not happened yet this year, but going by preregistration it will have been something like Foil B3 100+ fencers, Epee A3 65+ fencers, Saber B2 25+ fencers.

I think this is a very spiffy idea. Please let me know if there is any way we can help out with your plan.

[KD5MDK]

What sort of standard are we looking at here? For example, the Longhorn Open is regularly an A4 tournament in Men's Epee, and strong A2 in WE. However, Sabre is a B2. The Pouj is similar, although it has Mixed Epee, and isn't part of an existing circuit.

[Craig]

Originally Posted by KD5MDK

What sort of standard are we looking at here? For example, the Longhorn Open is regularly an A4 tournament in Men's Epee, and strong A2 in WE. However, Sabre is a B2. The Pouj is similar, although it has Mixed Epee, and isn't part of an existing circuit.

First step is to pull together suggested tournaments and then we can look at them and determine what natual cut off points suggest themselves on a per weapon/event basis. I think we'll see some natual cut offs by rating/level or by participation. Since I don't know what those are yet, I don't want to arbitrarily create one.

Craig

[Peach]

Start with this thread.

(Large non-NAC tournaments)

[davesaint]

Remenyik - This is in October at Northwestern University.

[tkrivosh]

Excellent idea,
although this is really the first year Nellya Fencers are hosting a series of tournaments, we definitely planning to make it into a series of annual sabre events where we guarantee at least an A2 level. We'll gladly participate in listing

[Peach]

FAP is planning to host an elite sabre event in the Philadelphia area on, I believe, May 21. Details to follow.

[fluidfencer]

Craig,

Definitely a great idea. Deciding which to include would be tough but not impossible. A pretty big task though. You would also need some people who everyone could trust to be objective, you certainly qualifying for that.

Would they be qualifying tournaments in any way, or just an informal circuit? This is one of the very critical issue that have to be decided by the USFA. Call it "regionalization" or whatever you'd like. Many other sports handle things in this way for a reason.

Establish selection criteria (a BIG task)
Create a web site to submit information
Choose tournaments

Sure would be nice to work with the USFA on this. I mean, how different is this idea than a Super Youth Circuit that provides national points?

[Craig]

David,

This is a totally unofficial and informal circuit. If we as a community get something put together and can work it as a way to encourage those of us who like these tournaments to start travelling and meeting then it will help this community.

The USFA may or may not decide to use what we learn to help with the regionalization decisions but that isn't what I'm looking to do here.

The most I would do with this is create some sort of points list for the fencing.net community to use for this. Call it an "underground" or "unofficial" or "secondary" circuit. The main thing will be bragging rights. If the concept catches on, maybe there can be more.

[Craig]

I went back to the "big tournaments" thread that Peach linked to and pulled the listing out. Look below, are there any others?

Amazon epee (women's epee), Washington, DC, June
Big Apple Open, New York, NY, September
Canadian Selection Circuits, (multi, see Canadian fencing calendar)
Charm City, Baltimore, MD, December
Cherry Blossom Open, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, April
Crescent City Open, New Orleans, LA, March
Crown of Texas, Amarillo, TX, June
Duel in the Desert, Las Vegas, NV, January
Liberty Cup tournaments (sabre), New York, NY, June
London Heroes, London, Ontario, Canada, January
Long Beach Invitational, Long Beach, CA, October
Longhorn, Austin, TX, October
Mr. Ma Cup, Cherry Hill, NJ, June
Nick Toth Invitational, Colorado Springs, CO, September
Phoenix Cup, Mesa, AZ, May
Pomme de Terre, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, June
Pouj, San Marcos, TX, January
Remenyik, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, October
Rose Condon, Bossier City, LA, January
Temple Open (any collegiate fencers), Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, November
The Big One (New England collegiate fencers), Smith College, Northampton, MA, November
Tournoi Baton Rouge, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, May
Veterans Challenge (veteran fencers), Boston, MA, September
Virginia Hangover Open, The Plains, VA, January
Virginia Kickoff Open, Richmond, VA, September

[tchwojko]

This would be a great calendar/list to have on the USFA website as a service to the rest of the membership who does NOT regularly go to NACs.

The only events listed currently are the NACs. Every other tournament in the US requires going to each division individually, and figuring out where the heck the tournaments are listed, whether that list is up to date, and guessing as to the size and quality of the tournament.

Now I would NOT put every tournament up on the calendar, but put limitations on it, to avoid noise. The tournaments probably should have at least several of the following qualities:
* A history of running regularly (3+ years?)
* A minimal size (32+ participants? 64?)
* A minimal rating (A2? B4?)

I know that schedules are not always determined that far in advance, but the list above, with a general time frame, and general location (even if it's only the season and the state!) would be immensely helpful.

It would also be simple free regional marketing for the divisions who host the event.

I only came upon fencing.net by accident, and I find it ridiculous that I get more useful and accurate information here than on the official national or divisional web sites (generally speaking, I know some are better than most), or the American Fencing magazine. (Heck, forget the web, just have a list on a part of one page in the magazine.)

[veeco]

I think what I'd like to see in this circuit is that the strongest 5 events in each weapon get assigned into the circuit, and not that each event gets all 6 weapons. It would also be nice if there was at least one event on each of the coasts, one in the midwest, one in the south, and another "floating" one (or perhaps in Canada).

Go for strength rather than support of all the weapons/genders in one place.

Oh, that AND make use of FRED a requirement to be a part of this circuit.

[Inquartata]

This is a great idea, Craig. As it stands one either has to hear about worthwhile tournaments by word of mouth or sift through dozens of Divisional and Sectional websites. A centralized listing calendar would be a very nice resource...

[Peach]

A requirement for the events listed should be that the organizers arrange for paid referees in all weapons.

[RebelFencer]

Sounds pretty wicked awesome.