Archive for the ‘Fencing Results’ Category

Fencers Attacking Diabetes

Tuesday, September 16th, 2008

This last weekend in Cleveland, Ohio, UFO was a supporting club of the Third Annual Fencers Attacking Diabetes Open. This event was held to benefit the American Diabetes Association. This event was also the Northern Ohio Division’s Sectional Circuit event for this year.

Saturday, September 14

On Saturday there was mixed Sabre and mixed Foil. Ben Schleis was the lone Michigan fencer in the mixed Sabre event which featured 19 fencers (if a few more Michigan Sabrists would have shown up could have been at least an “C” level event). Ben was able to epee his way through his pool with a 4-1 record and even forced the A rated Sabrist to have fence harder than she wanted to. In DE’s, Ben continued using his Epee bounce to good measure until he met a Sabrist that wasn’t shaken up with it and defeated him for a very solid 3rd place finish.

Mixed Foil saw Judi Isaacson, John Arkison, new UFO’er Matt Reesman, and (she does fence occasionally) Amy Webster amongst the 61 total fencers (three away from a possible A3). Judi and John used there epee skills during the pool round. In Judi’s DE, she had to the referee so well trained with her epee skills that they did not see her actual parry-ripostes! Amy drove all the way to Cleveland to fence Liberty Lakes fencer, Brett Spangler. Matt was the victor in his first DE and fenced very cleanly in his second but was not able to win the bout.

Sunday, September 13

Sunday featured the Open Epee event. This event had 72 registered fencers, unfortunately the event was 2 A’s or B’s away from an A3 rated event (with ratings being given out all the way down to 32)!!! UFO representatives were John Arkison, Andrew Aitken, Judi Isaacson, and Ben Schleis. In pools, John had a 3-3 record, Judi finished 4-2, Andrew was 2-3 and Ben was 4-1. Judi was able to channel the spirit of Julio Mazzolio (an example of finesse and clean, precise bladework) to win her first DE. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to help her through the next one. John Arkison defeat David Leighton and moved on to fence Daniel Rahl (who drove all the way from Leslie, MI to fence John). Andrew Aitken’s first DE was a very close match. The bout went back and forth with very close touches and neither Andrew nor his opponent were able to gain more than a 1 touch lead. After the first break, Andrew’s opponent started to crack under the pressure (even though she had a one touch lead at the time). As the bout went on, Andrew kept his cool and was finally able to string together 2 touches in a row which finally mentally destroyed his opponent and gave him the victory (and fit of crying for her after the bout). Ben defeated his first opponent and for his second DE ended up driving all the way to Cleveland to fence Brett Spangler! Brett had some very quality touches but at the end of the bout, Ben had the larger quantity and was victorious. His next opponent was GLSC’s Dan Rahl. Dan started the bout with a 7-4 lead in the first period. After the break, Ben came back to take the lead and win the bout. Ben was defeated in the next round by one of Hooked on Fencing’s fencers for a 7th place finish.

Overall, UFO fenced very well and represented Michigan very well at this Sectional Event. All of the UFO fencers had a good time and for the most part were pleased with there finishes.

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This is Duëlist

Sunday, August 31st, 2008

The fencing season was kicked up to “11″ with the Ann Arbor Duelist Open.

For those that do not get what all this means here is an explanation:
The Ann Arbor Dueling Society hosts an open every August which effectively starts off the new season. Everyone’s USFA membership expires on July 31, so this is a typical event where people will re-register. This being the 11th year that the Duelists have hosted the event, the theme “this one goes to 11″ was shown on the t-shirts. Alluding to the movie, “This is Spinal Tap”, specifically the scene below:

The Mixed Foil event was an A2 event with 34 fencers participating. All of the UFO fencers fenced quite well in pools. Glenda Jeffords was able to defeat friend of UFO Tom Evangelisti in the pool round and was also able to score touches on most of her opponents. Erica King defeated the B fencer in her pool on her way to a number 9 seed. Ben Schleis did well and lost only to one of Michigan’s top fencers, Sam Nemechek. Grace Lisius showed excellent actions defeating the other U and having good touches on her opponents.
In the DE’s, Glenda Jeffords was defeated by Sam Nemechek. Though Glenda fenced very well, she was not able to defeat Sam. Erica King with her 9th seed had to fence fellow UFO’er Grace in the first round. This bout was a well fought bout by both fencers. Erica was defeated by an out-of-state B in the round of 16. Ben Schleis’ first bout was against FAS’ Tom Evangelisti. Tom showed Ben some good actions but ultimately Ben was the winner. In the round of 16, Ben Schleis faced Dan Bock. In a very close bout that had Ben wiping his brow over multiple hits that did not register (including one that resulted in a yellow card). Ben won the bout and advanced to the round of 8 where he ran into Sam Nemechek. Ben was not able to resist counter-attacking into Sam’s march (a typical epee response) and ended up defeated about 15-8. The top 8 finish for Ben resulted in his renewing of his “C” rating. Yves LeBlanc, UFO fencer in spirit, was equally succesful in his DE bouts. Yves defeated WMFA’s Haley Conover on his way to a third place finish earning himself a B08 rating in the process. Congratulations, Yves!! (C’est le vie)

Sabre was a very difficult E event with only 12 fencers (3 fencers away from a C rating!!). The only UFO fencer was Ben Schleis amongst the many RFC sabrists and a couple of Duelists. Ben started off slow in pools, losing his first two bouts but pulled off a 3-2 record placing him as the 5th seed. Ben was fencing quite well in the first two rounds defeating his opponents and in the semi-finals met RFC’s Justin Weiber resulting in a “Beer Bout”. Justin led at the break 8-6 and kept a 2-touch lead throughout the match. Ben was able to catch up and claimed the victory (and the beer) winning 15-14. In the gold medal bout, Ben was pitted against RFC’s Keith Bizek. In a well fought bout, Keith came out on top taking the gold and giving Ben 2nd place.

Like most years Epee showed many of the Duelists coming out of the woodwork to show that they still fence and with 41 fencers was an A2 event. Sally Lee became a UFO fencer in name as well as spirit and came out of pools with 2 victories (and a really sweet wrist pick on her “A” fencer). Avery Gase has not yet forgiven Ben for making last year’s Duelist 10 his first tournament. His claim is that he wasn’t ready!! This year having a better idea of what to expect (and having all of his weapons working from the start) Avery was able to get touches on all of his opponents. Judi Isaacson is still testing her new mobility but unfortunately is not yet 100%. Judi was able to land 3 touches on her “A” despite not having her full mobility. Ben Schleis had a very rocky pools going 3-2 with his weapons causing trouble throughout the pool. His last bout due to weapon problems gave him a 4 touch deficit that he made up (once his weapons all worked) winning 5-4. John Arkison fenced very well despite not winning all the bouts that he felt that he should have (sometimes that happens). Andrew Aitken had a awesome pool round going undefeated on his way to a #1 seed in the DE’s.
In DE’s Avery met one of the few Duelists that fence with UFO during the week, Scott Favre. Despite the bout being interrupted due to some issues with the tableau, Avery was able to upset the higher seeding Scott thus insuring that Avery finish much better than his previous Duelist experience!! Great fencing Avery! Sally and John were a second clash of UFO fencers. Unfortunately there can be only one! In this case, it was John Arkison who came out on top in a very good bout and Sally did avail herself excellently. Andrew Aitken feeling pretty good about his top seed from the pool round didn’t let it go to his head and maintained his composure in his first DE. Andrew brain-grenaded his opponent with his absence of blade and composed fencing. Way to go Andrew! Unfortunately in his next DE the opponent was quite fast and Andrew lost in the next round. Judi Isaacson was pitted against David Leighton from Escrime du Lac and defeated him soundly. Her next oppponent was HOF’s Liam Butterfield, sadly, Judi’s footwork has not completely returned and she was defeated. Ben Schleis seeded 14th and drew the Ann Arbor Sword Club’s David Hornstra for his first DE. Ben was victorious and his next opponent was HOF’s Liam Butterfield. The bout was very close with Butterfield leading for most of it, Ben was able to pull to 14-14 but a slight exposure of his pinky gave up the winning touch and Ben’s three weapon day was finished.

UFO availed itself quite well in this event. Great job, everyone that showed up and excellent fencing!

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Welding Class Open

Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008


Yesterday, UFO hosted the Welding Class Open. So named because Amy has learned how to weld and made up some really cool awards. This event also marked the debut of UFO’s new grounded metal strips which arrived and were installed Friday evening.

These awards were cool enough that they enticed a large contingent of fencers to trek up from Ohio. The event’s preregistration page was quite impressive with potential A’s and B’s to be awarded (except in Sabre which went until Wednesday before having more than 2 preentries).

Mixed Sabre

Despite a calling out by Tom Evangelisti in his weekly email newsletter, 5 Sabre fencers took part in the event (2 of whom had bad knees). When all was said and done, Keith Bizek came out victorious and got the first welded fencer of the day. UFO’s John Arkison came in second. Tom Evangelisti and Nathan Goretski took the third place finishes in the event. The highest finishing U was Judi Isaacson who finished in 5th place.

Mixed Epee

Mixed Epee had a total of 21 fencers making the event a B1. Ben Schleis took first place renewing his B rating. Ben’s fencing apparently did not know the way to San Jose as he does wish that he fenced close to the same at Nationals. Dan Weckstein unfortunately much earlier than he would have liked and finished in 6th. Judi showed more mobility and finished 15th. John Arkison finished out in 16th place. The highest finishing D was Courtney Dumas. Highest E went to Shawn Barnes. And the highest U was awarded to Keith Bizek (fencing Epee because he didn’t want to wait out the time between Sabre and Foil).

Mixed Foil

Due to some last minute arm twisting to get 25 (thank you John Arkison) and getting one of the directors to fence with his off hand (tip of the hat to Andy Tulleners), Mixed Foil had the potential to be an A2 event. The two lone UFO fencers in Mixed Foil were Grace Lisius and John Arkison (who finished 25th and 22nd, respectively). Cody Murphy played the part of spoiler by defeating Andy Tulleners (one of the B’s that needed to make the round of 8) to knock the event done to a B2. When all was said and done, Anatolie Senic defeated Mike Cho in the gold medal bout. 3rd place was taken by Mike Purdy-Sachs and Yves LeBlanc. Highest D was Keith Bizek (who walked away with a complete team of welded fencers). Highest E was Alinah Purdy-Sachs (earning her D in the process). And highest U was Michelle Zehe.

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