Congratulations to our Fencing teams who have made it into the Nationals in Brisbane this coming June.

Coming equal third out of 11 teams was our Senior Foil A team made up of:

• Winston Lin (12/FL)
• Jack Murtough-Coombes (11/KL)
• Deklan Rollason (11/MO)
• Ben Diskin (9/MO)

Coming second out of three teams was our Senior Sabre A team, made up of:

• Tom Barker (11/FL)
• Leon Qian (10/MA)
• Alistair Shaw (9/LE)
• Oliver Smart (9/KL)

Senior Sabre A team representative Leon Qian said the National qualifier was both enjoyable and challenging as they tried to defeat a difficult adversary.

A tip to junior players, Leon adds “I think something upcoming fencers should learn is to have confidence in their decisions during a bout. An attack was often lost because the attacker would hesitate or even stop. However, fencers should also recognise when they can’t attack and when they should retreat. Blade control and footwork are paramount”

Fellow teammate, Alistair Shaw agreed saying the experience was “exciting, empowering and definitely confidence-building”. His tip to other players is to make the most out of training sessions “Don’t just mess around. Think about what you need to improve on and work on it”. For him, he said the best part of competing the National qualifier was the opportunity to train and compete across various age groups and go against really good athletes.

Our fingers are crossed as our New representatives head into tougher competition ground in only a matter of weeks. Best of luck to them, and their dedicated coaches and supporters.