Newsletter November 2013On Target

Newsletter of Fencing NSW November 2013

NSW squad fencers triumph in Australian Cadet Championships

This year’s Friendship Cup and Koala Mini Challenge on the weekend of 23-24 November was a big challenge and a huge success for NSWFA. There were 226 entries in the individual NSW champion-ships on Sunday in three weapons, boys and girls, in U13, U11 and U9 age categories.

The number of individual entries was up 30% on last year.

On Saturday morning, there were 52 teams entered for the Friend-ship Cup.

Once again, we had a strong team from Japan with 8 young girls and boys and three coaches making the trip to Sydney strengthening a bond of friendship forged after the 2011 tsunami.

Young fencers from New Zealand, Papua-Indonesia, the ACT, Victoria, Queensland and, of course, from NSW participated in two days of competition, preceded by a training camp on the Friday.

It is a tribute to the skill and hard work of the members of the DT that we got through both competition days on time. Special thanks to Gordon Christie, Denise Dapre, William Hay and Edwin Lapitan.

We couldn’t have done it without a committed corps of referees - 17 on the Saturday and 27 on the Sunday. Thank you especially to Simon Capon, Matthew Dall’Asen, Matt Donald, Boston Fawkes, Mitch Fox, Dimi Giovani, David Lu, Mark Marsi, Natalie Molen-Grigull and Jasper Rowley who spent many tiring hours on their feet.

Thanks also to Wendy Dall’Asen who organised the raffle and Chupa Chups guessing competition (won by Boston Fawkes only one-off the correct number of sweets left in the tin - 604), raising $565 for fencing.

And a special mention for Alex Andre and Antonio Signorello who pulled it all together, and to Leslie and Peter Witkop and all the volunteers who pitched in the make the weekend a great success.

Marrickville Council Chips In For New Pistes

Huge Turnout for Friendship Cup/Koala Mini Challenge

Open Air Fencing for Super 8

Above: NSW wins the 2013 Friendship Cup with the highest overall points score.

Right: Gold medal winners - the NSW U11 Boys Foil Team.

Rain dampener for Super 8 exhibition matchesAfter weeks of fine weather, rain kyboshed plans to stage this year’s Super 8 competition outdoors as an exhibition of the best in NSW fencing. Instead, the event was held at Marrickville.

Hopefully we’ll have better luck next year and ideally we can find a covered venue.

The 2013 Super 8 winners: Edison Cai (Men’s Foil), Rita Sokolovskaya (Women’s Foil), Luke Mansfield (Men’s Epee), Elizabeth Hatcher (Women’s Epee), Adam Wilcock (Men’s Sabre), Priscilla Del Castillo (Women’s Sabre).

On Target Newsletter November 2013

U13/U11 Weapon Sizes Clarified

Teams for Open National Championships

Men’s Foil: Cai Wei Ting, Sholto Douglas, Matthew Donald

Women’s Foil: Margarita Sokolovskaya, Lishan Sung, Jackie Budniak

Men’s Epee: John Downes, Romain Courtois, Nick Davies

Women’s Epee: Sarah Osvath, Elizabeth Duff, Annalyse Davison

Men’s Sabre: Adam Wilcock, Phil Miller

Women’s Sabre: Priscilla Del Castillo, Natalie Molen Grigull, Sally Bennett

Team Managers: Hugh Cotman (foil), Richard Emmerick (epee), Michael Howard (sabre).

In accordance with the selection policy, the top three ranked fencers in each weapon are pre-selected for the ‘A’ Team with the fourth member being the highest ranked fencer in the individual event not already selected. The next four highest placed fencers in the individual event comprise the ‘B’ Team.

We wish all of our fencers competing in Canberra good luck and a successful and enjoyable competition.

Congratulations to fencers who have qualified for selection for NSW ‘A’ Teams at the Australian Open Championships to be held at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra in early December.

Gala Dinner Get Your Booking InSaturday 30 November is our big night of the year - celebrating a big year of fencing achievement across all age groups.

Grand Prix prizes will be awarded together with special awards for Best Fencer, Best Club, Best Coach.

The theme is All Sports - so come dressed in any sporting gear you like. Zero points for fencing garb, unless it’s really creative.

The dinner will once again be held in the pleasant surrounds of the Concord Golf Club.

You can book a club table of 10 for $750. Individual tickets are $80.

Individual tickets can be paid for online via the website. Table book-ings will need to be confirmed via email to admin@nswfencing.org.au and paid for by cheque before the dinner.

Juniors off to Tokyo and Hong KongA great experience awaits 24 Junior grade fencers from NSW and other States in the 2014 ‘Junior Asian Tour’ in January.

In Tokyo, they will train with the Japanese National Team at the Japanese Institute of Sport Science and compete in the Tokyo Olym-pic Junior Cup.

In Hong Kong, they will train with the Hong Kong National Team and compete in the Hong Kong Junior National Cup.

The tour has been organised by NSWFA - thanks to Alex Andre and Antonio Signorello.

The fencers going are:

Foil: Callum Bodman (ACT), Matthew Dall’Asen (NSW)*, Matthew Donald (NSW), Sholto Douglas (NSW), Edward Fitzgerald (Vic), Matthew Foster, Beatrice Hay (NSW), Leah Mangion (NSW), Jesse Morris (NSW), Tyler Reynolds (Vic), Lucas Webber (Vic).

Sabre: Mathilda Barnard (NSW), Hannah Biskupic (NSW), Alice Clementson (NSW), Jadryn Dick (WA), Alexandre Douglas (NSW), Boston Fawkes (NSW), Tori Leonhard (WA), Harrison May (NSW), Jasper Rowley (NSW), Kitty Simpson (Qld), Matthew Tadros (NSW).

Epee: Theadora Kable (NSW), Ashleigh Syme (NSW).

Coaches: Hugh Cotman, Antonio Signorello

Introduction to Money Management & InvestingDo you need help in managing your money?We’ve been approached by the Women’s Investment Club which runs workshops for women athletes to learn how to manage their day to day money and their investments.

Check them out at www.thewomensinvestmentclub.com.au

If you are interested, please contact Meena Wahi by email to info@thewomensinvestmentclub.com.au

Meena may organise a workshop for those interested. The cost will be $25. Oh, and men will be welcome too.

Vote 1 - LukeIf you are going to the national championships in Canberra, don’t forget to vote for the Athletes’ Commission - Luke Mansfield is standing.

She has brought passion and poise to the fencing piste, coaching generations of young and the young at heart in the art of swordplay. With each lesson she instills in her students self-discipline, sports-manship and perseverance as well as a sense of fun. She has been known by one name long before celebrities made it commonplace. She is Vivienne, Head Coach of The Swords Club since 1975 and one of only three people to ever hold this title.

With the Centenary year of The Swords Club drawing to a close, and the imminent retirement of Vivienne at hand, the following article takes a brief look at the career of one of Australia’s most respected fencing coaches.

When Vivienne was 5 she saw a fencing demonstration at her local school fete. When she was 10 she loved to watch film stars like Errol Flynn and Tony Curtis swashbuckling their way from battle to battle, sword in hand and virtue on their side. She decided then that was the life for her. (Woman’s Day 13/8/1979) However it wasn’t until her late teens that she had the opportunity to try the sport and begin lessons with Professor Joan Beck at The Swords Club, back in the days of the Bjelke-Petersen Building in Castlereagh Street.

Not only did I enjoy myself enormously, but Professor Beck gave me excellent technical grounding which at the time I took for granted. She was a marvellous teacher. (Barrage N30 June 1990 p11)

Professor Beck must have recognized a special quality in her pupil, because when the time came for her to retire, Vivienne was one of three coaches chosen to train Professor Beck’s pupils. But within a few short years only Vivienne remained….and that was when her coaching career began in earnest.

It is easy to forget the challenges that faced a young wom-an embarking on a fulltime career as a fencing coach. A fencing coach wears many hats – psychologist, technical expert, tactical wizard, mother/father, friend, mentor – and the list goes on. It’s hard to have the responsibility of always saying the right thing at the right time and I believe one must be flexible, continually com-ing up with new ideas and keeping tabs on developments (Vivienne 1990).

Sourcing permanent training fa-cilities was often challenging, especially with the rising city rents during the 1980s and 1990s. TSC spent time in the derelict Government Printing Office (splendid views though) and also at the submarine base at Kirribilli (security was touchy), before finding a home at North Syd-ney Girls High School in 1999.

In order to pass her fencing coaching ex-ams, (as set by the Australian Academy of Arms, a professional body of fencing coach-es), Vivienne was initially required to become proficient at coaching foil, epee and sabre.

Whilst she was allowed to teach sabre and epee to both sexes, women were unable to compete until many years later. (It is to the good fortune of The Swords Club that Vivienne’s preferred weapon has always been foil.)

Vivienne has been teaching at TSC since 1975, and in that time has instilled a love of fencing to hundreds of children and adults, as well as leading her students to State, National and International success. Vivienne’s devotion to the sport has seen her contribute hours of personal time to coach, and support Club Members.

Commenting recently on what she liked most about coaching she said I always enjoy seeing the smile on the faces of beginners when they learn how to parry quarte riposte, quarte riposte, (i.e.counter riposte), and watching the excitement when they find out how you can use feints. I have met so many amazing people, talented or otherwise, and it’s been great to teach them, see them improve over time, be involved in their lives, and achieve a personal best result in competitions.

Vivienne’s contribution to Australian fencing has been immeasur-able, for example, in 1977 Vivienne and Steven Treloar, held the inaugural State Schools Championships. The competition soon be-came the biggest in NSW with the NSWFA eventually taking over it’s organisation after many years of time and effort put in by Vivienne. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s Vivienne was the Secretary of the Australian Fencing Coaches Association. She regularly travelled around Australia presenting weekend fencing seminars on coaching

and training camps. For approximately 20 years she was employed by the NSWFA to be part of, then in charge

of, State week-long training camps to prepare fenc-ers for the U/20 Australian Championships. She was also involved in many National training camps.

Vivienne also started up the very successful (and social!) Manly Warringah Fencing Academy which

ran for 33 years before being transferred to Antonio Signorello. She taught at Macquarie University and

many schools including the Kings School, Abbotsleigh, Wenona, Glenaeon, Barker, St. Leos and others. For 20 years she ref-ereed at every NSWFA junior and novice competition, together with many senior competitions and Australian Champion-ships. (The list could go on…)

Vivienne’s calm demeanour but insight-ful and encouraging nature will be sore-ly missed. However she is planning to stay involved with fencing at some level as it has been such an enormous part of her life.

For an extended interview with Vivienne and her future plans, view the TSC Newsletter November edition at www.theswordsclub.org

Newsletter November 2013

Vivienne ~ A L i f e by t he Sword