In a New Collective Approach to Training, European Fencing Goes All Out For Olympic Stardom.
On October 27, more than 50 junior athletes and coaches from across Europe gathered in Luxembourg for an intensive week’s training which featured epee and foil fencing.
Olympic champion and world champion fencers are backing a new and innovative collective approach to training that matches developments in any professional sport. In an opening to the new four-year Olympic cycle, on October 27, more than 50 junior athletes and coaches from across Europe gathered in Luxembourg for a PRO-Olymp intensive week’s training which featured epee and foil fencing. The event ran through November 2, after which the athletes descended on Amsterdam for the Junior European Championship, which ran until November 8. Hardly allowing spectators to catch a breath, it is now back to Luxembourg for the grand finale: the World Cup.
This new collective approach, launched in 2006 by the international charitable foundation For the Future of Fencing, allows athletes from across Europe to face their competition, observe styles, and derive the true benefits of cooperation that experts believe can only boost their standing on the world stage. In stands in contrast to competitions of previous years, at which athletes were separated out, arriving in dribs and drabs from their home nations, and were thrust straight into competition, then shipped back home.
Demonstrating its approval, Federation Internationale Escrime (FIE), has now held similar events. And Alisher Usmanov, founder of For the Future of Fencing summed things up well: "This training is integral to the development of fencing as a global sport."
Leaders of the Olympic Committee of Luxembourg attended the opening ceremony, along with the presidents of the two key organizations involved in implementing the initiative: Aleksandr Mikhailov, President of For the Future of Fencing, and Armand Lemal, President of the National Fencing Federation of Luxembourg.
Observers will have a keen eye on future PRO-Olymp training camp calendar events, and on the progression of European fencers in the place that stars will truly shine: the London 2012 Olympics.
The event was orgainzed by www.fencing-future.com .
