Friday 9th May 2014
Medal for Dream Fencing Club.
The sun shone on the 33 lady epeeists as they arrived at Sussex University Sports Centre on Sunday for the Brighton Open Fencing tournament.
There were some well-known faces from various South East clubs as well as UK students and some oversees students from France, America and Italy who are currently studying here. Dream Fencing’s only entrant this year was Nicola Hull.
The first round poules saw Nicola win 6 victories and come out with a 3rd place seeding.
Her first DE fight was a comfortable 15-4 victory. The second was more challenging. After the first 3 minutes she was down 6-3. Nicola recounts that she ‘then I took time out to think and yes stepping back with a parrie quart does actually work!’ By the second period the score had been evened and the third period saw a 14-10 victory to Nicola.
Thankfully her next DE into the medals was slightly easier as her opponent and fellow veteran, Jenny Morris, who had previously beaten Nicola at Aldershot, was out of steam. So a 15-6 victory saw Nicola into the medals.
Nicola then faced a French lady who had been dispatching her opponents with ease, had great footwork and a very accurate hand. Nicola went 3-0 down before remembering the words of wisdom Yosif is forever pouring into her head, ‘if it’s not working, change something.’ So Nicola took the épée by the pistol grip and changed tactics! She began to concentrate on her distance and keeping her épée point in the direction of her opponent’s guard. By the second period the scores were even, and then the third period ended when the women were 9 all, as the referee stopped the fight for ‘passivity’. Priority went to Nicola and the fight went into a final minute. Nicola managed to penetrate her opponent’s defences and scored the first hit. Both fencers thought she had won. However, Nicola recommends learning the rules as they found out that you have to fence the entire minute if it's due to passivity! The French lady came charging in but Nicola held her nerve to win by 2 clear points! She was delighted.
The finals saw Nicola up against a very tall American pommeller. Despite her best efforts she couldn't collect the blade effectively nor draw her opponent into making an attack she could parrie, and Nicola lost the fight 15-9.
Many congratulation to Nicola from all at Dream Fencing for her hard fought silver medal!
Nicola’s words of wisdom are;
‘Other than growth hormones required’, 'Do listen to Yosif. What he tells you to do in training really does work when it comes to your fights!’