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whtouche · 03-21-2006, 01:46 AM

Inspired by the two or more threads about NCAA nationals recently I decided to start a thread for club nationals. Any predictions, who wins individual, squad, team, etc.
Can Army repeat? Did they even win it last year or am I remembering incorrectly? Any new participants who we should know? Usually in the form of somebody with fencing experience going to a school with a club team? For example last year I can think of at least 3 or 4 random teams with standard club-team level fencers across the board, and one reallly good foilist.

Any new additions for sabre that I should know about?

Well, here's one I guess. This year UMass has a freshman sabre fencer with some experience, by the name of Kevin Shanahan. I expect him to do pretty well, most likely to the tune of second place. I'm not saying who if anybody I think will finish ahead of him, but know that he's good for a silver medal

I hear Texas A&M thinks they can win sabre squad. Does anyone know anything about them?

KShan5[PrFC] · 03-21-2006, 01:51 AM

UMass takes men's sabre and men's 3 weapon, that's all I'm gonna say

TooLoftheDeviL · 03-21-2006, 02:27 AM

I predict that I will win everything ever.

FencingKitten · 03-21-2006, 03:30 AM

Texas A&M, say what you will about them (and I usually do), has a close-knit sabre squad. The guys have been fencing together for YEARS, literally, and they know what they're doing. Can't speak to skill personally, except to say that they (along with everyone else in this weapon) kick my ass pretty regularly, but they're not to be discounted.

UT Austin is going, and of course I must predict that they will win everything, just out of Alumna loyalty

IU_Epee · 03-21-2006, 11:13 AM

Indiana University should have a shot at medaling in men's and women's team epee and possibly women's team foil. We'll have a full team this year (up from 8 last year...) so we'll do better in the 6-weapon, but probably not much higher than 5-6th.

Saddly, our world-cup foilist is back in Germany this year.

seak · 03-21-2006, 11:15 AM

Maryland will be there this year! : )

We should have basically a full team and contend for some individual medals (crosses fingers).

It should be a good time regardless

MyrddinsPrecint · 03-21-2006, 12:59 PM

William and Mary will be there this year-- they weren't last year, but they were in at least one previous year. The word on the street is that one of their mens foilists is a B (a sophomore? i think). one of their mens epeeists is a C. i don't know how good either of them realistically is, but considering they're a team that just didn't bother trying to put together the money for nationals last year...... they sound pretty decent.

Michelle Weinbaum, who won WS last year, is not fencing this semester, so she won't be making a repeat performance. In fact, a lot of the people who were in individuals last year in WS aren't there this year.... but at least some of them were seniors.....

Smith has had a couple knee injuries recently. that will affect WS at least a little--- how much is unknown at the time-- probably to the tune of not as good as it might be, but better than last year. WF is about the same as last year. WE is a little better than last year.

seak · 03-21-2006, 01:08 PM

One of their foilists, Tommy Hennig is an A he just finished 2nd at JO's. He's also currently 16th or 17th on the Senior Points list.

He is trained by Allen Evans and also fences at Willam and Mary. Overall their entire foil team is very strong.

Oh yeah and I predict that he will win men's foil : )

MyrddinsPrecint · 03-21-2006, 01:15 PM

yeah. he would be the B i heard about a while ago from a friend on the team-- i hadn't realized that he'd gotten his A.

neither has every section of their website, as the Buy a Date With Tom still says he's a B....

MyrddinsPrecint · 03-21-2006, 01:20 PM

oh, also, they're just a mens team.

not, it seems, because the women's team is NCAA.

"Can women join the fencing team? Yes! While many times a man will be taken into the team over a woman, this should not be surprising or offensive, as we are a men's fencing team. We compete against other men's teams in the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Fencing Association, and, while women are allowed to compete with us, we generally do not have the space to train as many women as men from scratch. "

seak · 03-21-2006, 01:20 PM

Yeah its a recent thing as he earned it at JO's

It lead to much screaming by a certain member of the GWU team : ) (they will not be at USACFC's though)

Dannon · 03-21-2006, 03:23 PM

2nd place in JOs? Geez.

I've been bumped up to A-strip from C-strip last year due to graduations, and I've spent the last three months doing research in the tropics with no fencing. This could end up kinda of ugly...

seak · 03-21-2006, 03:41 PM

I'm sure you'll do fine, there's a reason I picked him to win. While there will be a lot of good fencers there, most of them will be closer to the Div 2 level in the A slot.

What school are you from?

Dannon · 03-21-2006, 03:47 PM

Oh, heh, I didn't realize i didn't mention my school.

I'm a foilist from Dartmouth. We did pretty well last year, so I hope we can do that again, even with a lot of graduations.

I missed qualifying by indicators on C-strip last year, so I really have no clue how i'll do on A-strip.

And again, i think our sabre squad has chance to do really well. We've got three really good guys.

whtouche · 03-21-2006, 04:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dannon

And again, i think our sabre squad has chance to do really well. We've got three really good guys.

Dartmouth sabre should do pretty well, top to bottom there seems to be less of a fluctuation, from A to B to C this year as there was at least last year and they should be pretty solid at least for the crowd.
I think you'll really miss the A strip from last year, especially for the team round when he went nearly undefeated except for one loss

He was fun to fence too.

oiuyt · 03-21-2006, 06:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MyrddinsPrecint

"Can women join the fencing team? Yes! While many times a man will be taken into the team over a woman, this should not be surprising or offensive, as we are a men's fencing team. We compete against other men's teams in the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Fencing Association, and, while women are allowed to compete with us, we generally do not have the space to train as many women as men from scratch. "

Huh. At least when I was in school MACFA allowed women on the teams IFF the school didn't have a women's team. Sounds like W&M should fall under that status, but they seem to believe that they are limited to having men on their competitive team. Isn't the wording that I would choose if my intent were to say that a team selects the best fencers regardless of gender and wanted to express the idea that that might mean that only men would be selected. The verbiage that they've chosen to use rather implies that they will select less-qualified men -- both for competition and for training opportunities -- over more-qualified women.

I find that both surprising and somewhat offensive. Not to mention quite possibly actionable in a legal sense of the word (IANAL).

Mmmm, off to go browse their site to try to gather additional context.

-B

seak · 03-21-2006, 06:19 PM

hmmm, may also be becuase certain MACFA coaches (especially coaches past) certainly STRONGLY prefered all men teams.

oiuyt · 03-21-2006, 06:24 PM

The next two Q&A responses in the FAQ:

Quote:

That's not right! The College has a responsibility to allow everyone an equal chance at fencing, regardless of gender! We couldn't agree more! That's why we encourage you to ask the Kinesiology Department to revive the fencing class that it once held. Understandably, though, we cannot be expected to provide that service to the College; that's simply not what we're here for. We would love to see more people learning how to fence, but, given our limited time, space, and coaching resources, we are unable to do more than we do right now.

How can you restrict membership to your club? Per our constitution, we are organized as a competitive intercollegiate men's fencing team.

Unhuh. Not sure this makes it any better. Now gives the impression that they're intentionally posing the problem. Not a bright idea, more likely to get your constitution pulled then to help women. Shouldn't be particularly difficult for a female W&M undergrad to force a constitution admendment via simple complaint to the Rec Sports department.

Still looks like an open invitation to legal action from someone not "asked to join the team." If one is not so invited then the only option available is the three-week novice instruction (from which the invitees are culled) offerred each semester.

-B

Beowulfman6 · 03-21-2006, 07:05 PM

I would go a step farther and say that W&M's policies are absolutely sexist and have no place in todays world. I would encourage someone there to take legal action if need be.

When I read the FAQ's section I was shocked that they could get away with this. It seems to me that even if they are sexist pigs they should at least be interested in growing and developing their program- or maybe they aren't willing to accept the fact that a woman can be as good as or better than a man at fencing. It sounds to me like their club is an exclusive, preppy, white, upperclass, male thing- They aren't helping themselves and they aren't helping the sport.

seak · 03-21-2006, 07:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Beowulfman6

I would go a step farther and say that W&M's policies are absolutely sexist and have no place in todays world. I would encourage someone there to take legal action if need be.

When I read the FAQ's section I was shocked that they could get away with this. It seems to me that even if they are sexist pigs they should at least be interested in growing and developing their program- or maybe they aren't willing to accept the fact that a woman can be as good as or better than a man at fencing. It sounds to me like their club is an exclusive, preppy, white, upperclass, male thing- They aren't helping themselves and they aren't helping the sport.

Wow, I think this might be a little harsh. I know a few of the fencers on the team and they aren't sexist, know women can be good fencers, and hey some of them are in fact women : )

I am suprised about the policy however, at UMD you are allowed to restrict a club based on sex i.e. men's baseball and there are men and women karate clubs etc

Again my guess is this has more to do with MACFA's attitude towards women fencing then W&M's, and the fact that they were a men's varsity team and have basically kep the coach and everything else the same even though they are now a club