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Veterans Fencing
Fencing is a sport which can be continued throughout life - what may be lost in agility and speed can
often be made up in experience and cunning.
Our very own Tom Rafter and Michael Ryan at the World Veteran Championships, Bath 2006 |
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While it is not unusual to find older fencers succeeding well against competitors less than half their age,
recent years have seen the emergence of competitions restricted to those over forty years of age. These Veterans
events now include an officially recognised World Champonship and European Championship, with different age categories
ranging up to seventy years or above. |
Recent years have also seen the emergence of a Veterans Quadrangular Competition, involving veteran teams representing
England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Different countries are taking steps to encourage veteran participation in these and other competition, and in many cases
have established links to the European Veterans Fencing Committee (EVFC), set up in xxxx to help promote involvement by older
fencers, and to give them a wider range of competitive opportunities.
In Ireland, the last few years have seen participation in World and European Veterans Championships and in the Veterans
Quadrangular. To encourage further growth and help co-ordinate veterans activities here, in March 2008 the IFF set up a sub-committee,
the Irish Veterans Fencing Committee (IVFC), and affiliated it to the EVFC. Two veteran members of the IFF Committee, Tom Rafter
and Michael Ryan, were appointed to the IVFC and charged with increasing its membership. Tom represented the IVFC at a meeting of
the EVFC in Madrid in May and was cordially received.
The IVFC invited all interested in veterans fencing to a meeting on Wednesday 11th June. There was a good attendance. A further
three members were sought for the Committee, and there were two volunteers, Yvonne Murphy and Eric Kemp, who were approved at the
meeting of the IFF Committee on 23rd June.
Over the next few months the IVFC will be making plans and looking for ways to increase veteran participation. If you are over
forty, and have ever fenced, we would like to hear from you. In any case, watch this space.
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