Fencers Continue Winning Streak

Cardiff, Sunday lunch time. Imperial Fencing Women’s 1st park the minibus and make their way through the labyrinth-like venue to find the fencing piste. On the schedule for the day are Oxford and Cardiff University, ranked last and middle of the league respectively. Are the Imperial girls going to continue their incredible streak of victories?

It all starts with sabre against Oxford. Jing Xiao (Jingles), Emma Horrix and team captain Zoe Robinson dance up and down the piste, continuously extending the lead until the score is 45-27 and the match is over. The epeeists step up next, ready to extend the lead even further. However, Oxford isn’t giving up that easily, and they keep an advantage of a few hits at the start. As they reach the end of the first half, Imperial’s Caitlin Jones and Kat Young decides that enough is enough and from there turn it around to Imperial’s lead, and together with Charlotte Levin keep it all the way to 45-37.

With two weapons fenced, Imperial is ahead by 26 hits and the girls quickly calculate that they need to score 19 hits in foil to win overall. Despite Oxford being the clearly stronger team in the weapon, Zoe, Charlotte and Alice Mitchell together manage to pick point after point, ending at 23-45 and an aggregate score of 113-109. One down, one to go!

Facing a home team is always more challenging. Cardiff also has different strengths than Oxford, and the weapon order had been reversed. Starting off with foil, Zoe, Charlotte and Alice stay on piste and make every hit count. Similar to the epee match against Oxford, Cardiff starts by taking the lead. But once again, Imperial proves that they’re top of the league for a reason, and half way through the lead has swapped sides and stays like that until the very end when Imperial loses by a single hit. Ironically, the epeeists repeated what the foilists just did almost identically: Cardiff takes the lead at the start, Imperial takes it back half way through but then lose by that single hit that is an athlete’s worst nightmare.

If there had been any doubts previously about who would stand victorious at the end of this match, it quickly faded during sabre. Imperial had to win by 3 hits to secure the victory, and the sabreurs did not disappoint; 71 hits later, 45 of which were Imperial’s and 26 Cardiff’s, the match was over. Overall the result was 133-116 and the girls could return to the minibus in a good mood, and celebrate all the way back to London.