r/Fencing

Hello all!

I'd be grateful if anyone (the more the merrier!) would give their opinions on the current BoD slate.

I'm a life member who hasn't thought much about fencing in years but has a vote to cast in the election. I'm absolutely going to be voting to give a leg up for non-ffo candidates... But... Wow. I don't know a darned thing about most of the others. And it occurs to me that I should actually pay some attention to that, too.

So. If you're so inclined, please take a moment to persuade me (and any other under informed voters) about who you think is awesome!

Many, many thanks for your time!

Has anyone dealt with the hole that develops on the fencers’ sneakers from the lunge/drag of the back foot?

I was wondering if a patch could be glued on but a material that is like a leather repair patch so it doesn’t develop the hole. I have two fencers and they both get the same hole. Sneakers are relatively new.

There’s self adhesives that are meant for leather repairs one can cut and apply. I rather put it on before the hole develops to protect that spot.

I got a nice email from candidate Nona Lim, who seems fine. I did note that one of her points is:

>Sustainable Growth

>The future of our sport depends on strong pathways for athletes at every level — from youth development to collegiate opportunities through NCAA programs and the continued growth of the veteran fencing community.

People have said stuff like this for years, and yet US Fencing continues to not demonstrate any interest at all in growing fencing in the US.

Two immediate places one might look at, if one really did want to grow fencing in the US, are coaching development and fixing the competition ladder:

• Restart something like Coaches' College. We get all kinds of excuses as to why it's not feasible, none of which really hold any water. Every other sport I've been involved in has recruited coaches like hell. I got recruited to be a coach multiple times a year when I was a US Sailing member, for example. If we want to grow fencing we need more coaches. Coaches make fencers. All the outreach and publicity and so on in the world won't help if those newly interested prospective fencers look around and find no place near them to fence.

• Competition pipeline. Right now the national competition pipeline does two things: It runs Div II and Div III events, which kneecap large local events. And it features a huge, largely unavoidable hole once the fencer ages out of Juniors. A 25 year old B has no reason ever to go to a NAC. It cuts the center out of post-college fencing in the US. We all know this, we've known it for decades.

Are there any prospective board members who actually plan to address any of this?

As title says, moving to NYC and want to keep fencing. Adult age, 5 yrs of experience, intermediate to advanced level or D rating. Would love any advice/info yall have! Commute is not really an issue if the club is awesome enough, I’ll be in manhattan! Thanks yall :)

The most recent thread on fitting bags into cars was Europe based. Let’s try again for US cars. Particularly interested in used EVs. Anyone have a not Tesla that fits a rolling bag with the seats up?

So far Toyota bZ4X and VW iD.4 failed. Subraru outback passed so I am hoping the TrailSeeker has the same size, but I’m also looking at the used market.

Voting opened today for USA Fencing’s Board, RC, and Hall of Fame elections and will run until May 31. I would argue that this election is the most important that we’ve had in a long time and brings us to a crossroads. Please review the candidate materials, the conflict of interest report from the Ethics Committee, and then vote (ballot should be in your emails). You do not have to rank everyone and in fact I would recommend only ranking the people you like. Good luck to all the candidates and thank you in advance for participating in our democratic process!

Info on candidates for Hall of Fame, Board, and RC available at the attached link under a separate page for each election.

CoI report: https://assets.contentstack.io/v3/assets/blteb7d012fc7ebef7f/bltc98596a3c81c1919/69d6f82f50a5a60e4c1a833e/USA\_Fencing\_Ethics\_Committee\_Elections\_Report\_2026.pdf

If anyone has any questions let me know, I used to serve on the Nominating Committee and I currently serve on the Ethics Committee (though I recused myself from the CoI assignments for the election).

Hi, I have a 350n epee mask but the the bib is not detachable. As I've used it for awhile the bib has go quite abit of dirt. How do I clean it?

every time I start to set up an attack, the guy just backs up, all the way down the strip. I end up chasing him for like fifteen seconds, get tired, and then he suddenly stops and scores on me when I'm out of position. It feels like I'm fencing a moving target instead of an actual opponent. My buddies just tell me to just hold my ground and make him come to me but then the ref calls passivity on both of us. anyone have a way to trap someone who refuses to engage.

Very quick background: my youngest kid is preschool age and for months now he is obsessed with sword/sabre dueling and observes footage really closely and then reenacts a lot of what he sees and honestly does a good job of it. I don't know much about fencing personally, but I showed him some Olympic fencing footage and he was really captivated by the sport and said he would love to do this.

As someone who has no background in fencing, is preschool age way too young to start with some basic classes- is it better to wait another couple of years to try? Definitely in no rush to put him in classes or anything at all, just curious since he's so interested in it.

I know there have been several new fencing apps that have come out in the last few months but I have also been working on something that I think still brings a lot of unique features for fencers of all levels.

Here are some key features:

- Auto-fills profiles using the USA Fencing membership database
- Search any opponent by name to pull in their rating, club, and division
- Log bouts, lessons, and tournaments all in one place
- Attach video to any of them, and share specific clips with your coach with up to 2TB of cloud storage
- Coaches can leave written feedback directly on bouts and lessons
- Packing checklists for competition day
- A short mental-prep flow for the morning of a tournament
- Easy access to a bar code of your membership ID to scan at tournaments

Video and comments are thoroughly monitored. Built with students in mind, so coaches and parents can both feel comfortable.

FinalStrip is a PWA, so there's no app store download and will work on any device. Just open it in your browser and save it to your home screen. It will guide you if you have not done it before.

I spent quite a bit of time building this and wanted to make something I would have used had I started my fencing journey today. It's free for 30 days, and you'll get a reminder email 3 days before the trial expires.

Would love to hear what you think.

The website can be found here at: finalstrip.com

Although it can be match-up dependent, I've noticed some passive or defensive-minded fencers have a habit of frequently retreating to the end of the strip as an opponent marches on them. I'm fascinated by this pattern, as it would seem that the option space for the defender shrinks significantly once at the back of the strip. Yet I have seen this play out many times in the favor of the defensive fencer, even against opponents who like to march. Is this something you can only do selectively for fencers with limited finishing skills? Just wondering what's going on in the mind of the defender here, and if any people who have this habit actually prefer engagement with nowhere to retreat to.