Funny or Unique Fencing Stories

[Tim McMackin]

Well, here's a quickie that I find funny. We fence foil exclusively here at Xavier University, but we have a little epee and saber equipment more for demonstration than anything else. One day we decided to break out the other stuff to try something different. Our current gung-ho "swordfighting is cool" freshman went straight for a saber and promptly gave me a few welts on the wrist, about an hour too late to have right of way. I went back for a thicker glove, while he went crazy shadow-fencing, slashing at the air, lunging, and stuff.

A bystander: "What's wrong, Tim? Can't you take it?"
Me: "You don't know how hard he's swinging that thing!"

Just then - SNAP - his blade breaks off and flies across the room. He was slashing the air so hard he broke the (admittedly old) saber blade without actually hitting anything. No one fenced sabre with him again for a long time.

Tim

[Fleche]

there is a guy in my club who is a very good fencer, and he often fleches or jumps up and flicks you over the back.

One night (on the only night I wasn't there) this guy was fencing a newer person from Italy (who is a very good fencer) and the guy fleched at the Italian. The Italian fell on the floor and rolled around in great pain. It seems that his arm had been dislocated. He explained to the guy (and my mother, who was there instead of me) that this had happened before, and could they please pop his arm back in please? They were too squemish, so they went to the hospital. The guy had changed out of his whites, but my mother was wearing her jacket and the Italian was in full electric gear. So they rock up to the hospital in white suits (imagine how that must have looked!) with the Italian holding his arm up in the air. My mother laughed so much that she couldn't go in with him. She did however, sucker the doctor into joining fencing . . .

Also, a few weeks ago, the same guy was fencing another guy when the other fell and broke his arm! You can imagine the jokes we had about fencing this guy . . .