Philadelphia Division Sabre

[Peach]

I just wanna announce that we had an ACTUAL 15-PERSON SABRE Tournament at FAP in the Philadelphia Division USFA today, and Andrew Bielen renewed his C at it.

Not only that, everybody who showed up (it was snowy and there were a couple of other tournaments this weekend) was from FAP.

Anybody who knows the Philadelphia Division knows that for years we (a) haven't had enough sabre fencers at division tournaments to make 15, let alone 6 sometimes, even when drawing from several different clubs, and (b) FAP is better known as a foil and epee club.

I am so psyched. It's great not to be one of a mere handful of competitive sabre fencers for a change.

[Peach]

Oh, yeah, and I meant to add, where the heck were the other sabre fencers in the division? Come on, guys, it wasn't THAT snowy.

[Artisan]

Results?

I'da come...to watch, but went to CDE for the epee, where there was a paltry 10 person turn out. 4 of us from FAP, 2 from CDE and 4 from BCAF... whats up wid that?

After the official DE, we did a pool of 1 touch epee, kinda fun - if not a bit pointless - more of a test of patience than anything else.
Plugging in and testing took longer than most bouts.

[damianip]

I'd have gone to CDE with my son, but we had the Div II/III qualifiers here in NJ today.

In retrospect, I should have gone to CDE (went 2-3 and didn't make the round of 16). Got a lot of directing practice though.

Well, maybe I'll do better at the sectionals.

It gets tough around now when NY/NJ/PA all start their qualification process. The other tourneys in the area suffer.

Paolo

[Peach]

Originally posted by Artisan
Results?

I'da come...to watch, but went to CDE for the epee, where there was a paltry 10 person turn out. 4 of us from FAP, 2 from CDE and 4 from BCAF... whats up wid that?

After the official DE, we did a pool of 1 touch epee, kinda fun - if not a bit pointless - more of a test of patience than anything else.
Plugging in and testing took longer than most bouts.

There was a foil at BCAF as well, I think. I dunno why the CdE tournament was so small when the FAP tournament was big. I agree with Paolo that the qualifiers really mess up the competition schedule, but ours haven't started yet--I think this might have been the last chance.

Who won the epee and how'd you do?

We had some extra fun with our tournament too--we had 7 women so we had a women's pool and a men's pool before we did the official rounds.

Uh. . . overall results. I can give the top eight.

Andrew Bielen
Ahren Lalonde
Mark Drasnin
Jake Sands
Delia Turner
Dena Blumenthal
Erin Reichelberger
Suzanne Vogt

I may have Dena and Erin reversed.

One reeeeally nice thing was that Pascal Cantin happened to be in town, so we had world-quality refereeing with the occasional amused snicker thrown in. It was one heck of a fun day. I also achieved my main goal, which as always was not to hurt myself.

[Artisan]

Ahh results....CDE epee, only 10

lets see:

Mark Holbrow
Jeff Bumgarden
Gerald Snead
Jeff McGalliard
Erik Ridge
Tony Sacksteder
Chandler Clay
Milton Lindsay

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>I just wanna announce that we had an ACTUAL 15-PERSON >SABRE Tournament at FAP in the Philadelphia Division USFA >today...

And I have it from the horses mouth (in a tongue in cheek gloat) that one nationally ranked womens epee fencer did better than expected against one male assistant coach... with her off-hand....

Just shows to go ya.

[Peach]

Originally posted by Artisan
And I have it from the horses mouth (in a tongue in cheek gloat) that one nationally ranked womens epee fencer did better than expected against one male assistant coach... with her off-hand....

Just shows to go ya.

Yes, she was telling me about that with GREAT satisfaction tonight. And the female non-epeeists in the crowd took great satisfaction in that as well . . . I told her she's getting the FAP Purple Heart (she's still stiff from fencing off-hand) because she rounded out the 15 and made three new ratings possible as well as the renewal of a couple of others.

Funniest thing I ever saw was at the Susquehanna Open one year when two Penn State guys fencing the mixed sabre were in a DE against one another, and the left-hander and the right-hander traded lames and both fenced it off-hand. Lord that was dumb-looking.