{mosimage}Keri Byerts (16, Portland, Ore.) won bronze at the Junior & Cadet World Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria today! Byerts was third in the Cadet Women’s Epee event of the Championships, which runs April 1-8.
Byerts showed grit on her way to the medal round, pulling off three 15-14 victories in a row to start off the table of 64 and then beating Bianka Bukoczky of Hungary 15-8 to reach the medal round.
She was defeated by the eventual gold medallist, Ba Da Lee of Korea, 15-10 in the semifinals.
Seeded first after the pools, Kelley Hurley (15, Medina Texas) lost her bid for the final eight to Russia’s Ekaterina Joulkova 15-11. The third U.S. cadet, Christa French (15, Southlake, Texas) was seeded third after the pool round but lost her first direct elimination bout to spoiler Sarla Kelo of Finland 15-10.
US Cadet Max Williams (15, Sacramento, Calif.) earned a top-8 finish and defeated the top seed in the competition, Julien Medard of France, 15-14 before falling to Luigi Samele of Italy 15-13 in his bid for the medal rounds.
German fencer Benedikt Bock, seeded 44th after pools, went on a streak and defeated both U.S. cadet Matt Kolasa (16, Princeton, N.J.) 15-12 in the round of 64 and Jonathan Berkowsky (15, Sicklerville, N.J.) in the round of 32, 15-14. Bock advanced one round further, upsetting fifth seed Ehsan Mohammadzadeh of Iran before being defeated in the round of eight by Marinos Prevenios of Greece.
Cadet Women’s Epee
2 April 2004
79 competitors
1 LEE Ba Da KOR
2 GRIBOVA Valentina EST
3 BYERTS Keri (16, Portland, Ore./NorthWest Fencing Center)
3 JOULKOVA Ekaterina RUS
5 IZSO Katalin HUN
6 WON Hye Ji KOR
7 BUKOCZKY Bianka HUN
8 BERGDAHL Johanna SWE
9 HURLEY Kelley (15, Medina Texas/Team Hurley)
33 FRENCH Christa (15, Southlake, Texas/Grapevine)
Cadet Men’s Saber
2 April 2004
62 competitors
1 SAMELE Luigi ITA
2 KALYNSIY Vasyl UKR
3 NEIGER Antoine FRA
3 PREVENIOS Marinos GRE
5 BEAUDRY Philippe CAN
6 DOLNICEANU Tiberiu ROM
7 WILLIAMS Max (15, Sacramento, Calif./Lucchetti Fencers Foundation)
8 BOCK Benedikt GER
20 BERKOWSKY Jonathan (15, Sicklerville, N.J./Fencing Acad. of S. Jersey)
33 KOLASA Matthew (16, Princeton, New Jersey/Fenc. Acad. of S. Jersey)
For More Information Please Contact:
Cindy Bent Findlay
US Fencing Media Relations
USFencingMedia@earthlink.net
614.746.6733 * 614.340.7299 fax