Fencers in the News: Rebecca Ward

Rebecca Ward, 16, is one of the youngest FIE-ranked saber fencers in the world. Since October 2006, Rebecca has been one of the top two women's saber fencers and one of the top five junior women's saber fencers.

On Feb. 29, 2008, Ella Loescher from SchermaOnline interviewed Rebecca. SchermaOnline is an Italian fencing site, so most of the site is not in English. In fact, Rebecca's interview is the only thing I've seen so far that is not in Italian!

Rebecca's currently getting ready for the 2008 Olympics, but she took some time out to talk about her school work, training and life. While much of what she said doesn't apply to SSH, some of it is very interesting. I especially enjoyed this quote about being a team:

[W]e try our best to kill each other in the individual meet, and then, the very next day, we're asked to put all that aside and make sure we're there for our teammates. The hardest time is when one or more of us has not fenced very well in the individual competition and are not feeling confident about fencing in the team meet. As a team, we have to do everything we can to get everyone ready to fence their best.

Fencing is not usually a team sport, and even in team fencing, the bouts are always one-on-one. Sometimes it is hard to remember to support your teammates because fencing, even team fencing, is such an individual sport.

Feel free to read and enjoy Rebecca's interview, which is linked above. A lot of it refers to her competitions back in 2006, but it is not all old news!