Confess! Anyone here ever a fencer? (College, HS or Jr High)

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

I fenced in HS. Actually, I was on my HS's first women's varsity sabre squad, since up until fairly recently it had been considered too rough for women. Originally, I was going to be a foil, but once my coach heard about my karate background and saw my aggressiveness, I was moved to sabre. I loved it. Too expensive to do it on my own though.

[ZombieNixon]

1. I fence stolen diamonds for beer money.

Does that count? :D

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

2. Only if it involves this..

[SteppingRazor]

3. No, but I occasionally used to goof off with the team after school...

we had one guy who was ranked something like No. 8 in the country. He would stand still, keep his feet planted, and still stab the shit out of me. It was real impressive. If I walked around to his other side to get him in the back, he'd just switch his foil to his other hand and switch up his stance, and still stab the shit out of me.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

4. Haha...one of the few cool people in my dojo was a 3rd degree black belt

in Isshinryu karate (what I study) and an ik-kyu (almost a black belt in Aikido). It was insane sparring him. All of a sudden, he'd do some akido thing, and before you realized it, you're standing on the opposite side of the ring, facing a wall, and you have no recollection of getting there, except that he seemed to have lightly grabbed your wrist. He lives in CA now, but he was fun as hell to train with. Also, one of the few liberal black belts in my school.

[SteppingRazor]

5. I did karate for a little while myself...

some American kenpo and some aikido. I didn't get very far, though. Dropped out of aikido after attaining Third Kyu. Dropped out of kenpo just before earning my blue belt.

[seemunkee]

6. Took a class in college

Somehow I ended up in the class for phy ed majors so it was bit more intense than the regular class. I had a friend working at a sporting goods store so I bought a pair of foils and masks.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

7. Fencing is a really physically instense sport.

I'd start to look anorexic (but with a disportionately muscular right arm) during fencing season. Three hours of fencing practice every day after school, plus I was doing about 3-4 hours of karate 3-4 times a week in prep for my black belt.

[seemunkee]

10. I ended up blowing it off to go climbing

Same with handball, X-country and wushu.

[RumpusCat]

8. I'm dating a foilist, does that count?

So I've been to a ton of tournaments. She tries to get me to join up but I refuse to start up a sport that my girlfriend is already great at. Besides, empty-hand is more my style. It is an expensive sport, she does drop a ton of cash on equipment and travel to tournaments!

I note with pleasure that as far as sports go fencing is pretty gay-friendly for whatever reason (the European influence). My gf and I are a big obvious dyke couple and we've never had so much as a sideways glance.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

9. It's quite a gay sport.

The Santelli tournament was all-girls. It was also time to check out the dykes. It was my favorite fencing event.

As for the money, when I did it in HS, the school covered all travel and equipment. It's a good thing, because during the off-season, I was traveling around competing in karate. I had sponsors, but it still cost my family a lot.

[BreweryYardRat]

11. Nope. WMA is more my style.

If you can't do things like this to someone (with blunts and proper protective gear, of course), what's the point?




Now, if I could just find a sparring partner...

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

12. If you were closer, I'd be your sparring partner.

[BreweryYardRat]

13. Heh. Thanks.