Fencing is one of the oldest sports in history, and, more importantly to me, ever since I first joined the University of Oregon Fencing Club nearly three years ago, I've learned that it is by far one of the greatest sports ever to exist.
The intensity of focus, the one on one nature of the sport, and the ability to pit your wits against a lone rival to see whose strategic and technical brilliance triumphs in the end are but a few of the reasons that I would recommend this sport to anyone. I engage in a lot of athletic activities such as rock climbing, swimming, volleyball, tennis, and occasional pick up basketball, yet fencing brings me a satisfaction outclassed only by my main sport of mixed martial arts. There are numerous good reasons for that.
One on one. As I already mentioned, the ability to pit yourself against a single other individual is an unbeatable, adrenaline generating sensation. In team sports, which I still love, it's too easy for interference to block a competition between you and someone else. It's easy to fall into excuses like your team underperformed or you yourself synchronized poorly with the team. In basketball you could be interrupted by a screen or a steal from someone else. In volleyball it's about synchronizing and playing your small, fragmented role within a larger whole. In fencing there is nothing of the sort. It's just you and the other person. You can rely only on your own skills, state of mind, and athleticism. You see truly who is the superior competitor. If they beat you, you have no one to blame but yourself. They were simply better than you at that moment. To me, achieving victory under such conditions is the ultimate thrill.
Absolute focus. I find that the focus required for fencing is a bit different from your conventional sports. Because of the nature of fencing (linear on a strip, solely one adversary), your attention is minimized to a small number of things. Unlike in volleyball or basketball where you keep track of other players and the ball, or rock climbing where you can zone out and focus on just the one thing (climbing), fencing is unique because you're forced to concentrate on your opponent and their relation to you. That brings us to my next point, which I hope explains this concept better.
Strategy. Fencing is fundamentally different from other one on one sports. In MMA, it is possible to dominate with pure physical ability and natural advantage. The best fighters usually aren't the people who do this, but some very potent ones do emerge as a result of these latent advantages. In fencing, such things as inherent athleticism or speed, height, and innate ability to observe are practically negated at higher levels. That isn't to say that you don't need a certain level of physical ability. You very well do, but the winners at nearly all competitive levels, right up to the very top of the fencing world, are the technicians. The people who have mastered the art of fencing above all else. It is cunning and strategy as well as mastery of the dynamics of the sport that bring you victory. Natural advantages cannot take you as far in fencing as in many other sports. You cannot bully your way to the middle, let alone to the top.
Swordplay. You see it all the time in movies and television, in comics and written stories. Characters clash with epic blade work and intense action. Yet all of that is flashy, garbage nonsense. It's fun to watch, but the art of dueling that is fencing is much cooler. Fencing, unlike swordplay in popular media, does not focus on being flashy, but on efficiency. It's very simple, being based on bodily stance, fluency of movement, control of timing and distance, and blade position. Because of these things, fencing is very minimal to look at, and is also simply too fast for the eye to see well. The very reason that electric score machines are needed is to help tell who scored. Even those engaged may not necessarily know at first. Accuracy is almost impossible without planning ahead. You can only hope to strike somewhere on the arm or somewhere on the torso half the time. Fencing is about baiting the opponent, seeking weaknesses and exploiting them. I've scored a point off of moves that I didn't even plan because everything was too quick. I just happened to position my blade in a correct place because of a weakness in my opponent, and then when they moved my instinct drove my blade forward and I got them before they could even begin an attack. That's the sort of thing you see in fencing. It's not a bunch of huge movements like in the Star Wars prequels. This is finesse. Elegance. It's a mind game like Darth Vader vs Obi Wan.
That's why as soon as you become good enough to start seeing how the puzzle pieces fit together, you will be absolutely hooked. I first started fencing when I was 8 years old, and back then I hated it. I stopped at age 10, and didn't really pick up a blade again until college.
I only even really started because my girlfriend liked fencing, and I thought it could be something we could talk about. She was recovering from an injury, and I thought also that maybe I could help her get back in fencing form when she was feeling more healed.
That's what's crazy. I didn't even start fencing for me. I started it for her. And now, nearly a year after she and I broke up, I'm still fencing because I soon realized that it wasn't for her. It was for me because I had become addicted and I loved every second of it. I still love every second of it.
To me, fencing is a honing of focus and strategic cunning. It is a sport unparalleled in elegance and rivaled by few to none in efficiency. It is one of the most worthwhile things I have done since getting to college.
