The Sport

The Olympic sport of fencing is one of the oldest and most prestigious sports around. As far back as the bronze age, humans have had to learn the art of attacking and defending with swords. The sport as we know it today is a direct descendant of training meant to prepare gentleman as early as the 1300s for dueling and self-defence. It's only in the mid-1700s that fencing migrated away from strictly a martial pursuit to an athletic one. With the first Salles d'armes appearing in the mid-1700s, fencing as a sport flourished, allowing the aristocracy to enjoy it as a healthy and beneficial activity. It has been included in every Olympic Games since the founding of the modern celebration of sport in 1896.

Modern Olympic fencing comprises of three disciplines: épée, foil and sabre. La Résistance currently offers programs in épée, with a foil option for adults. 

Foil, originally designed as a training tool for gentlemen who were getting ready to duel, is a weapon of priority. In order to train for killing blow, only touches to the torso with the tip of the weapon were counted, with a set of rules governing who can score based on who was the attacker. Today, this priority (or right-of-way) system, means that modern foil is sometimes described as tag with sticks, but don't let that fool you: foil is an athletic and deeply thought-out endeavour, with its rules allowing for a flashiness and control unseen in the other weapons.  

Épée is a direct descendant of dueling as it was practiced throughout the centuries. Initially to the death, and then to first blood, épée retains the character of those deadly encounters: whoever hits first gets the point, and if both hit, both score. This creates  a no-nonsense style of fencing, with little margin for error and precise, strong movements. Épée is the easiest to understand of the weapons; you can hit anywhere to get a point, and you just need to hit first. But its simple rules belie its deep and complex strategies of push and pull, of provoke and attack. Épée is the slow burn of fencing, and only gets better the more you understand its intricacies.

Sabre comes to fencing by way of cavalry, and is the only one of the three Olympic disciplines where one can touch with the side of blade as well as the tip. This amps up the speed of sabre, and indeed to the uninitated it seems a wild blur of running and screaming. But sabre is a highly technical and highly precise game, where mere millimetres or milliseconds can make or break a match. Like foil, sabre is governed by priority, and fencers can only hit from the waist up (hands excluded). Exciting and always dramatic, sabre is hard to not get engrossed in.

As a sport, fencing emphasizes speed, agility, technique and quick thinking.  Fencers need to develop strength, flexibility, and lightning-fast decision-making to succeed.  Fencing is a healthy and safe way to learn discipline, to explore new skills and to discover the joys of sweating.

So come, try a class with us and see for yourself!