With an eye on winning gold medals in fencing at the 2008 Olympics, China did what it has done in a number of sports: hired a top foreign coach. In this case they looked Christian Bauer as head coach. The Frenchman has previously coached the Olympic teams of both France and Italy.
Bauer coached France to world titles in 1997 and 1999 and followed that up with Olympic Team Silver in 2000. After the 2001 World Championships he became Italy's coach and coached Aldo Montano to Olympic Gold in 2004. Shortly before the 2006 World Championships, Bauer left for China.
[Photo courtesy FencingPhotos.com]
In this interview, Serge Timacheff speaks at length to Christian Bauer about the Chinese fencing team, his approach to coaching and more.
