Dark Horse Fencing – Fredericksburg, VA

In the second equipment repair clinic, Coach Tom will demonstrate how to rewire foil and epee blades. Part two of the clinic will be on Wednesday, February 1st from 7:30 to 9:00PM at Dark Horse Fencing.

Coach Tom demonstrates how to clean a foil tip.

Dark Horse will present a fencing demonstration at the KWBES Family Health and Fitness Night on Monday 23 January at 7:30PM.  The club will be manning a table from 5:30 to 8PM in addition to the demonstration.  Directions to school are below (cut and paste the web site into your browser for a map):

http://g.co/maps/dfcq8

Weapons and equipment repair clinic on 25 Jan and 1 Feb. Coach Tom will be repairing equipment. You can take this opportunity to learn how to repair and maintain your own equipment and help the club maintain its equipment. The clinics will run from 7:30 to 9pm.

Keep up with the club schedule, learn fencing facts and terms, get results from DHFC members during tournaments!  Follow darkhorsefc on Twitter to receive a daily tweet from Dark Horse.  Following us on Twitter is a great way to get the latest status of club club closing during inclement weather or learn a fun fencing fact or new fencing term to become more familiar with our sport and its history.  When you can’t make it to the tournament, get the latest (unofficial) results on Dark Horse members.

To enter you must be at least 13 yrs old, a member of either club, and have electric sabre equipment. Wear appropriate safety and fencing attire (no shorts).  Up to twelve fencers may compete, therefore preregister as soon as possible.  So far, Dark Horse has two sabre fencers preregistered.  Following the round robin for seeding, the top eight fencers will advance to the Direct Elimination round (Elite Eight).

Please preregister by Feb 14 by emailing Coach George (sabrist).

Dark Horse Fencing Club hosted the 2011 Battle of Fredericksburg foil scrimmage with the University of Mary Washington Fencing Club on December 1st.  The youngest fencer in the field of 11 competitors, Alex “Czar” Ortner, won the scrimmage in sudden death overtime against the #1 seed, Justin “Kansas” Hurley by the score of 8-7. Congratulations “Czar”.

The scrimmage commemorated the 149^th anniversary of the American Civil War Battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia.  The two local clubs competed for the 10^th consecutive year.  Eleven fencers from the University of Mary Washington Fencing Club and the Dark Horse Fencing Club clashed on the cool autumn Thursday evening at Dark Horse Fencing Club.  Of the three types of fencing events, foil, epee and sabre, they limited their combat to the use of foils that evening.

Fencing for the University of Mary Washington “Eagles” were Laura Spain, Benjamin Wrightson, Derek Anderson, Paul Edemobi, and Cameron Branning.  For Dark Horse Fencing Club were Jean Lauzon, Liz Lauzon, Justin Hurley, Joseph Boudreau, Alex Ortner, and Sam Churchill.  The fencers competed in a preliminary round robin in order to seed the top eight fencers for the direct elimination round which decided the champion.   Reaching the direct elimination round were Cameron Branning (8^th seed), Benjamin Wrightson (7^th seed), Jean Lauzon (6^th seed), Sam Churchill (5^th seed), Joseph Boudreau (4^th seed), Paul Edemobi (3^rd seed), Alex Ortner (2^nd seed), and Justin Hurley (1^st seed).

Special thanks to Dark Horse youth, Nicholas Cook, who helped set up the fencing strips the night before the scrimmage; to all participants who helped restore the venue after the scrimmage; to Coach Tom for his assistance as head referee and to Charles Charest, UMWFC President, who acted as head scorekeeper.

Next major inter-club scrimmage is the St Valentine’s Sabre Massacre, 16 Feb at 7PM.