The following is a blog entry by US Men's Sabre fencer Tim Morehouse. The blog is currently being redesigned, so we thought we'd share the entry here until it's new home is ready.
The First Victory at a tournament…
Is making it to the tournament with your equipement and getting to fence!
Its day two in Venezuela and our women's saber team has just finished dominating the zonal championships with Sada taking first, Mariel second and Becca finishing in third. This trip has already been filled with drama and controversy that has overshadowed the great results.
The biggest drama is that Jed Dupree was unable to fence because he wasn't properly registered by the USFA and/or he was mistakenly withdrawn by one of our delegates who was then unable to re-enter him in the tournament. In a tournament that is counting double for FIE points, Jed, our hottest foil fencer had a very legitimate shot of being in the top-16 in the world with a strong result. He must now go into this season, one that will start the Olympic qualifying in May, without a possible double points finals result to help with seeding.
This was also not the only trouble we had with our team's entry. Jason Rogers, replacing Keeth Smart who had to stay home to work wasn't entered into the competition. Only after significant wrangling was he now added to the competition. He almost also flew all the way to Venezuela for nothing.
These events continue a trend of mishandling by the USFA of athlete entry into competitions. Early in the year, Joseph Wysocki flew to Madrid and wasn't entered into the world cup properly and there have been several other instances. The implications of this tournament however are huge and it should be interesting to see what happens as the details are sorted out. I think everyone is just stunned and saddened that Jed was unable to fence.
Tomorrow, we fence along with women's foil. There are about 42 men's saber entries with the top-16 recieving bye's from the pools. Every US fencer here is in the top-16. Its extremly hot here and we are fencing in an open tent arena. It definitely makes competing that much more of a challenge to battle the elements of extreme heat.
Hugo Chavez is also in town and its rumored that he may stop by the fencing tournament tomorrow! That should be interesting.
– Tim
