The annual USA Fencing Junior Olympic Championships are held in February in the city of Charlotte, NC. One of the participants is a Ridge freshman, Luke Sarmiento. Born and raised in Arizona, Luke has been fencing for a little over two years and has found fencing to be “more than a sport”. He first discovered his love for fencing when he stopped swimming and began to explore other sports. Through this experimentation, Luke found amazing camaraderie, as well as an activity he was passionate about.
Fast forward to this year, Luke has qualified for the USA Fencing Junior Olympic Championships. To be eligible to participate in this competition, you must have a certain amount of national and regional points, as well as certain division qualifiers. This varies depending on whether you are a junior or a cadet and if you want to participate in the junior or cadet events.
In preparation for the competition Luke trains frequently and has an overall mentality that if you always have confidence in yourself when approaching strong rivals, you have a sound shot at winning. When asked how he thinks the tournament will differ from what he has experienced in the past, he replied, “I know that when I go to North Carolina, there is going to be so much that I haven’t seen before.” He continued to say that since the fencing society in Arizona is somewhat miniscule, after some time one gets to know their opponents. At these championships, there will be fencers from various states and backgrounds of training, and this almost guarantees the use of unfamiliar techniques.
The events will be spread over the course of four days, from the 16th through the 19th. These days will be divided into several matches of the women’s and men’s epee, foil, and saber.
The epee event targets the whole body, meaning the fencers can strike anywhere from the mask down. Differing from the epee event, foil only targets the torso, shoulders, and neck. During the foil event, points can only be scored using the tip of the sword. Lastly, the saber only allows fencers to strike from the waist up. In the saber event, you can strike with either the edge or tip of your sword and get a point. The terms foil, epee, and saber are also used to describe different types of fencing swords used in these matches.
The foil and the saber events both share a rule called “right of way” which means if either opponent extends their arm first they get priority. This means that if the fencers hit at the same time, the athlete with priority gets the point, and this can change throughout the match depending on actions made by either competitor. When talking about the right of way rule and the junior epee event in which he chooses to compete, Luke stated, “I really think that rule is stupid and makes it feel ‘game-ified,’ compared to Epee, the blade I chose, feeling more like just raw swordplay.”
Going into this competition, Luke reports being nervous, but immensely excited- he knows that this tournament could possibly lead to him being put on the Olympic Fencing Team. Luke was asked if he would ever want to do any other sports, to which he replied, “No, I love this so much, fencing is so fun.” This sport is truly Luke’s passion and it is undoubtedly impressive the amount of skill he has. The USA Fencing Junior Olympic Championships will be captivating for anyone attending, and presumably life-changing for anyone participating.
