Fencing in Memphis

Waiting for the officials to post the pool assignments is complete agony. The only more agonizing thing is waiting for the direct elimination assignments to be posted. Those show the results based on how you and the other 120 fencers did in the pool. Fencing tournaments are long. They literally take up entire weekends depending on how many divisions you fence in. One event will take a whole day, most of which you spend waiting for your next location to be posted.

At the Memphis NAC, I was placed in a pool with six people including myself. They were the best fencers in the cadet age division (15-17 years). That’s pretty scary when you’re 14 years old and have only been fencing for less than two years, while they’ve been training since they were six. Basically, I considered myself doomed. I remember telling my mom, “No promises.”

First bout was called. I was on deck to fence a girl who had beaten me very badly two tournaments before this. First bout was done. “Elmo and Savage (last name changed) on strip, name and name on deck.” Deep breath. If I lost, it wasn’t that big a deal. I hooked up my cords and touched her with my saber to make sure her gear worked, too.

“En garde, ready, esgrime!” Two advances, one retreat, parry-repost. My point. She rubbed her wrist. I had hit her too hard. That’s what I was known for in the fencing community: big athletic goggles and hitting really hard. I won the bout 5-0.

I won every bout in my pool, mostly 5-1’s and 5-2’s. Between each bout, my mom would text my dad, who was at work. Normally my dad handled the fencing tournaments, and I liked it that way. Where my dad would say, “Get your head out of your ass!” my mom would say, “That’s okay. You’ll get her next time. Have some water.” Nothing is more enraging than a sympathetic mother when you’re trying to keep in the fighting mode.

Coach didn’t watch me fence that tournament. I don’t remember much about the direct elimination (DE) bouts. When I finished the pool and had two hours to wait for the DE’s to be announced, I casually walked back to where my team’s stuff was. Coach asked me how I did. When I told him that I won the pool, he responded in his thick Russian accent, “What, what does this mean?”

“It means I didn’t lose, Coach.” He sat down on my bag wearing his nice suit, not caring that it was caked with (and smelled like) two years’ worth of fermented sweat. He didn’t want me to know it, but I could tell he was pleased.