Medalists
Men
Discipline | Gold | Silver | Bronze |
Sword | |||
Command sword | |||
Rapier | |||
Command foil | |||
Saber |
Women
Discipline | Gold | Silver | Bronze |
Sword | |||
Command sword | |||
Rapier | |||
Saber | |||
Team saber |
Russia |
Fencing - olympic sport, in which opponents fight using special sports edged weapons that are completely safe. Conventional fencing is not at all safe, because it is a combat discipline that was actively used during military operations in the past. But as happened with many martial arts, this discipline these days has also become exclusively sporting in nature.
Participants in fencing games
There will be 212 men and women attending the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, 106 each. Based on the results of the competition, 10 sets of medals will be awarded, 5 among women and 5 among men. One country can nominate no more than 16 fencers, and no more than 8 of them are women and men.
The International Fencing Federation uses the principle of discipline rotation for a competition such as the Olympics. The 2016 Summer Olympics will feature different fencing disciplines than were offered at the London Games four years ago. Then the command saber was for men, and the command foil for women. In Rio, the men will have a team epee and the women will have a team saber.
Disciplines common to men and women:
- Sword;
- Command sword;
- Rapier;
- Saber.
Summer Olympics participants must prove themselves in order to qualify for the Olympics. For this purpose, Olympic qualification of competitions is provided; each continent has its own qualification. All competitions are considered qualifying tournament. The selection is also influenced by the world ranking of athletes.
Fencing competition calendar
Competitions for those involved in fencing will take place from August 6 to 14. Finals of competitions in a particular discipline will be held daily. Schedule:
- August 6: individual epee championship, women;
- August 7: men's individual foil championship;
- August 8: Women's individual saber championship;
- August 9: individual epee championship, men;
- August 10: women's individual championship in foil, men's individual championship in saber;
- August 11: Women's epee team championship;
- August 12: men's team championship in foil;
- August 13: Women's saber team championship;
- August 14: men's team epee championship.
In each discipline, to win you need to inflict a certain number of blows or injections on your opponent first. The competition is given a certain period of time, after which the fight ends.
Athletes compete in protective clothing: they have jackets made of metallic fabric and masks with rigid mesh. The hand that is not holding the weapon must wear a glove. The weapon is connected to the electrical panel. If a fencer strikes an opponent, this is recorded on the shield and a light comes on. If the blow was of insufficient power, for example, when the athlete only slid over the opponent, the injection is not recorded by the electrical system.
Rapier and sword require thrusting, but with a saber you can already deliver a chopping blow. Each type of weapon has a guard that protects the working hand from damage. Disciplines differ in the parts of the body allowed to strike.
For the fight, a fencing track is used. Its length is 14 meters.
The fencers competed already at the very first Olympic Games modern times (1896). Fencing is one of the four sports that were included in the program of all Olympics without exception. Participants in the 1896 Olympic Games competed in foil and saber wrestling (men only). The strongest among the foil fighters was the Frenchman Y.-A. Gravelotte, and among the saber fencers the Greek I. Georgiadis.
Another feature of fencing is how Olympic discipline is that already at the very first Olympic Games, professionals (fencing instructors) - the so-called masters - were allowed to participate. This peculiar privilege was noted in the rules developed by the founder of modern Olympism, Baron P. de Coubertin. Master foil fencers took part in the Games of 1896 and 1900. In 1900, they were joined by epee fencers and saber fencers, who also competed at the intermediate Olympic Games of 1906.
Since 1904, the team championship in foil fencing has been played at the Olympic Games (the first champions are the Cuban team), and since 1906 - in saber (Germany). Epee competitions were also added to the program: from 1900 - personal (R. Fonst, Cuba), from 1906 - team (France).
Women first took part in Olympic fencing competitions (foil) in 1924 (the winner was the Danish E. Osier). Team foil competitions were included in the program in 1960 (the first champions were athletes from the USSR; currently, women's team foil is excluded from Olympic program). Since 1996, women have also competed in epee fencing (in Atlanta, the French women excelled: both in the team and individual competitions - L. Flezzel). At the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, competitions among saber fencers in the individual competition were held for the first time (M. Zagunis, USA won).
There are among Olympic champions fencing their own record holders. The Italian N. Nadi is the only fencer who won 5 gold medals at one Olympic tournament (in 1920): in personal - foil and saber - and all three team types of the program (another gold medal he received at the Games in 1912 for winning the foil tournament). His compatriot E. Mangiarotti collected the largest collection of Olympic awards among all fencers - 13 (6+5+2), the athlete won them at five Olympic Games (1936–1960) in duels (individual and team) on epee and foil. The Hungarian saber fencer A. Gerevich is the only athlete in history to win six Olympics in a row (from 1932 to 1960), while in 1948 he won gold in both the individual and team competitions, and the last of his highest awards received at age 50. Another famous Hungarian saber fencer R. Karpathy participated in four Games, winning 6 gold medals.
It should be noted that until the mid-1950s, fencers from Hungary (saber), as well as Italy and France (rapier and epee) were the undisputed favorites Olympic competitions– and world fencing in general. (For example, Hungarian saber fencers won gold nine times between 1908 and 1960. team competitions at the Olympic Games - they won another title in 1988). But in the end In the 1950s–1960s, they had serious competitors, primarily in the form of athletes from the USSR, as well as fencers from Germany, Poland and some other countries. Our team of foil fencers set a collective record by winning the Olympic tournament four times (in 1960, 1968, 1972 and 1976).