Massialas World Champion – Imboden Brings Home Bronze

Greg Massialas, Alex Massialas, Race Imboden, Mauro Hamza celebrate Gold and Bronze in Cadet Men’s Foil. S.Timacheff/FencingPhotos.com

Alex Massialas won the 2010 Cadet World Championship in Men’s Foil He and Race Imboden led US efforts on Easter Sunday in Baku. Massialas upgraded from his 2009 bronze to gold by defeating 2009 silver medalist Edoardo Luperi (ITA) 15-13 in the finals. Imboden added a bronze to the US medal tally. He lost to Luperi 15-12 in his semi-final match. Brian Kaneshige finished 44th.

Alina Komashuk (UKR) won an all-Ukraine final, defeating Maryna Semenko (UKR) 15-5 in Cadet Women’s Sabre. Skyla Powers led the US women’s sabre fencers with a 14th place finish. Celina Merza finished 18th and Sarah Pak 48th.

Cadet Men’s Foil:

Massialas (left) showed from the start that he was ready to compete today, crushing all comers in the preliminaries where he racked up 6 victories while only being scored on 4 times. Massialas continued his dominance in the elimination rounds where no fencer reached double-digits against him until the quarter-finals where he defeated Alexander Tsoronis (DEN) 15-11. In the semi-finals Massialas won 15-14 over Kirill Lichagin (RUS).

In that match Massialas was behind 10-8 at the end of the first period. He was very patient in the second period which saw him tie the score at 10 all. In the 3rd period Massialas took over, trading touches at the start to knot things back up at 11 and then going on a 4-0 run to close out the bout.

Race Imboden faced a smaller preliminary pool and dropped one bout 5-2 to put him at 19th heading into the elimination rounds. Imboden responded well to his DE matches, steamrolling through his first two bouts with 15-0 and 15-1 victories. He faced a bump in the road against Kwang-Hyun Lee (KOR) but emerged victorious 15-12. He then crushed Hungary’s Antal Gyorgyi 15-2 to get to the medal rounds.

Rounding out the US foil effort, Brian Kaneshige finished 44th. He went 3-2 in the preliminary rounds and then lost a 15-12 match to Maxime Pauty (FRA)

Cadet Women’s Sabre:

{sidebar id=1}In the women’s sabre event Skyla Powers (USA) led the US effort with a 14th place finish. She went 4-2 in pools and won her first elimination match 15-14 over Kata Varhelyi (HUN) and then fell in the top-16 to Yana Egorian (RUS).

Celina Merza (USA) looked primed to go deep into the tournament after she went 5-1 in the pools. After a first round bye, she matched up against Russia’s Dar’ya Antonova. Merza led the match at the break 8-4 and continued into the 2nd period by trading touches until she had Antonova on the ropes leading 14-9. Antonova then figured Merza out, however, and went on a 6-0 run to win 15-14. Merza finished 18th.

Sarah Pak finished 48th. She failed to make the elimination phase after a 1-4 performance in the pools. Earlier in the season Pak had finished 3rd at the cadet event in Konin, Poland.

Cadet Women’s Sabre: Final Placement

Cadet Men’s Foil: Final Placement