CFFA Update 7.5.26

Last Sunday, James Russell and Jackson Jones were on an epee team with Nick Arzt and Michael Edgecomb from Foothills Fencing Academy in South Carolina. Their first match was a close 37-45 loss and they wound up 41/50.  On Monday, those two were in the huge Junior epee. It was so large that instead of the usual 80% going into the DE round, only 60% got to advance.  181 of the 420 fencers were As.  Neither was able to make the stricter cut.  Jackson was 0-6 to finish 409th, and James was 2-4 to finish 299th.  Tuesday was the busy day as we had three Vet fencers in different epee age categories.  Brendan McConville had an excellent 5-1 pool in the Vet-40s to get a bye in the first round of the DEs.  Alas, he then lost a close 9-10 DE to finish 35/82.  Herman Smith was 3-3 in Vet -70, then won his first 2 DEs, before losing to an eventual bronze medalist.  He wound up 14/43.  In Vet-50 we had Robert Thomas.  He was 3-3 in his pool and won his first DE before dropping the second to finish 52/95.  Wednesday finished up the Nationals for our fencers.  In the Div 1-A epee, James was 3-3 in the pool, got a bye, then pulled a big upset, before dropping out.  He finished a respectable 57/187.  Completing our week was Robert in the Vet epee team.  He teamed with Michael Edgecombe, and Scott Salzer from Montana.  Herman captained but didn’t fence.  They won their first DE, before losing the second to finish 30/45.

 

For former teammates, Erica Julien took the silver in the Vet-80 epee for women.  She says her mangled finger isn’t an excuse, but I find that hard to believe.  Kim Phillips claimed the 5th place medal in the Vet 50 men’s epee.

 

I am human and I make mistakes.  I totally missed that James and Jackson were doing the Senior Men’s epee and I wasn’t there for them.  I totally apologize for that.  If you see something I am missing, a date I have wrong, or even just something about which you have a question, please let me know.

Membership fees for USA Fencing are going up for next season.  Not tons, but about $10 per membership.  However, they don’t technically go up until August 1.  So, if you get your membership before then, you actually still pay this year’s fee. $10 is $10.