chocolate santa

We agreed it was a fine trophy. The club president had, as usual, brought a chocolate santa as the prize for the one-hit epee contest. It lay in a basket of miniature santas, on the floor.

With the inducement of chocolate, foilists and sabreurs prepared to join in. Their epee technique may be unconventional but with only one hit to count, it can be deadly. Usually the trick against foilistsor sabreurs is to look for that split second in which they try to establish right of way. In one-hit epee that's a risky strategy since a double hit means a double defeat.

I think there were ten or eleven of us in the pool unique and, for once, I wasn't the only woman. The Polish epeeist had borrowed breeches so that she could join in. She'd brought a friend, another epeeist, who was sadly left to fence foil with beginners and intermediates as he didn't have epee kit.

One-hit epee usually means more time is spent attaching body wires and testing blades than actually fencing. However, inspired by the thought of that chocolate santa, bouts were so slow that a stopwatch might have come in handy. Fencers advanced for a moment, then withdrew, keeping out of range of their opponents' blades rather than risk the hit that would defeat them.

On-hit epee can be wonderfully unpredictable. I achieved two hits, one against the eventual runner-up, though that my have been kindness on his part. There was a happy moment when the women fencing other weapons cheered me, and I managed my second hit.

At the end of the pool, two fencers tied for first place with seven hits each. The final duel was again cautious but won, I'm pleased to say, by a regular epeeist. His Oscar-style speech, thanking his mother, father, grandmother, great aunts, etc. was drowned out as he wiped away a pretend tear. He lifted his large santa for photos as the rest of us ate the miniatures.

I think the Polish fencers were surprised by our lack of seriousness and the amount of laughter between fencers. I think that was something they enjoyed - I hope so.

"real fencing ... like in the films"

I don't do sabre. Well, mostly I don't. But I've been flirting with sabre and, I'm afraid, keen to have a go. It means a new set of opponents, a new set of moves and, inevitably, different ways of hitting people and (mostly) being hit. It also means, on a night like tonight, with few epeeists or foilists, there's a lot more fencing.

The other (much younger) woman epeeist and I have been teasing the teenage epeeists for too long. Once we were spotted with sabres in our hands, they stood round us gleefully. Here were two grown up epeeists asking to be hit.

After a few jokes, two young men appointed themselves as our coaches and we were taken off for one-to-one elementary training. We practised dutifully and didn't say "ouch" when the teenagers hit us. Then the teenagers decided we were ready to fence one another. I overheard an argument. "My one's better than your one," my teenage coach began, starting a small dispute. I feared they'd be betting on us soon.

We faced each other, smiling hopefully, legs bent, arms in what we hoped was the en garde position for sabre. "Fence," said one of the teenagers and then, when each waited for the other to make the first move, "Play ... Go."

As we began to tap at each other and try to remember how to riposte after a parry, I caught sight of the eager teenagers and the humour of it all overcame me. I couldn't stop giggling. And my opponent started giggling too. We tapped and parried a bit, still giggling, and the teenagers drifted away.

Two sabreuses, one a veteran with a recent European gold medal and one a teenager with rather less experience, tried to help and encourage us. We still weren't managing speed and brilliance. After a while we returned to epee. "It's time to go back to normal swords," my opponent said. But we'd been corrupted by sabre. It was hard to remember to hit below the belt or use the force needed to attach the blade.

A coach took an interest in our attempts at sabre. He made us practise moves with him, taking turns to move backwards and forwards, parrying above the head. It looked good. It felt good too. As my opponent remarked, "It's real fencing - like in the films."

But we agreed that sabre was too expensive and too hot in summer. There is much more kit and the swords break easily in combat - a snapped sabre-blade flies across the hall every two or three weeks.. One of the teenagers showed off after his sword broke in four places - he thought there should be an award for the most dramatically broken sword.

So we aren't sabreuses. We probably won't try for Mistress-of-Arms in the club championship, though it's tempting. My opponent reckons she has a chance of a "hot date" so I'd be on my own. No woman does all three weapons. In theory I could come last in everything and still be a champion. But there isn't a trophy and I'm not sure there's enough sabre kit to borrow. And I think it would be more of a joke than a contest. But it might be fun ... I might even learn something. I could take on the entire club ...