Blog

Hi, Hope you had a great half term.

We welcome a very special but very young fencer this term.

First, the very special news is that Lewis (our head coach) and Laura are happy to announce the birth of their first child Morrigan, congratulations to them all, and best of luck for the future. We expect to see her on the piste in 6 years’ time (although I expect we can make earlier allowances for her)!

Our new term starts this Sunday 26th February

Term Details

Dates: From 26th Feb to 2nd Apr (6 wks)

Session Layout

9-10: Mini Fencers group course with Della

9-9.30: 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

9.30-10: Adults beginners courses, and if not 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

10-11: Non-electric/Steam group lesson with Della and Gordon

10-11: Teens electric group lesson with Lewis

10-11: Sparring

11-12: Sparring and 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis

1-2-1s and sparring is limited to just one court in the 9-10 session and will be offered on a first come basis

Fees

Costs for this term are £30/£36.  Please make payment for the term asap, this can be done online here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/purchase/. PAYG is still available to people with their own kit who do not want any tuition and will just be sparring, the cost for this is £8/£10 per week.

Competitions

There are no official competitions coming up, but there is a friendly competition happening this weekend.

**** TUNBRIDGE WELLS TWIST *************

RTWFC is running their annual TWIST event this weekend, its late notice but they have only just given us the details.  It covers U14, 16 & 19 age groups and is designed to be a fun competition.  If you want to book you will need to do it quickly, more details can be found here http://www.rtwfencingclub.com/competitions/twist-faqs/

Results from the competitions last term

County Junior

U12 Charlie 2nd Fintan 3rd.

U14 Harrison 3rd Will T 8th.

U16 Will K 2nd Fin 3rd.

BYC Regional Qualifiers

U14 Harrison 14th.

U18 Fin 9th (Q) Will k & Dan joint 13th.

U18 foil Dan 7th (Q)

Well done to everyone taking part.

May Half Term Indigo Course

Maggie Maynard will be running another one of her successful Epee Training Courses in Worthing from 29th – 31st May (10am to 5pm).  A number of our fencers have done these courses before and come highly recommended.  If you are interested Della and Gordon have further details.

See you all on Sunday!!

As always, please follow us:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lewesfencingclub

Twitter: @lewesfencing

Instagram: Lewesfencingclub

If you have any questions, please do just email the club.  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.u

Ash, Claire, Della, Gordon, Lewis and Simon

Welfare

If you feel something is not safe, please tell one of the committee members who will look to rectify it. You can talk to us during the session, or after the session via email,  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk If the issue is specifically welfare, i.e. child-related or you do not feel comfortable emailing the main email please us welfare@lewesfencingclub.org.uk  this will go directly to our Welfare Officer (Claire Cox).

Hi, First of all, we hope you had a great Christmas.

New Term

Here we go again, we start back on the 8th Jan, usual time and place.

Term Details

Dates: From 8th Jan to 12th Feb (6 wks) Advance notice next term is 26th Feb to 2nd Apr (6wks) Location: Lewes Leisure Centre

Session Layout

9-10: Mini Fencers group course with Della

9-9.30: 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

9.30-10: Adults beginners courses, and if not 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

10-11: Non-electric/Steam group lesson with Della and Gordon

10-11: Teens electric group lesson with Lewis

10-11: Sparring

11-12: Sparring and 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis

1-2-1s and sparring is limited to just one court in the 9-10 session and will be offered on a first-come basis

Fees

Costs for this term are £30/£36.  Please make payment for the term asap, this can be done online here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/purchase/. PAYG is still available to people with their own kit who do not want any tuition and will just be sparring, the cost for this is £8/£10 per week.

Coaching Survey

We are keen to make sure we are delivering the correct type of coaching for the club, could you please complete our coaching survey is found here https://forms.office.com/r/B6gDRCJQ8U.  As we have a wide range of fencers the survey has been made as wide as possible so some areas may not be appropriate for you but please complete it as best you can. 

Competitions

We now have our own Competition Calendar which can be found here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/competitions/ we will keep it up to date with competitions in the local area, for further afield competitions such as BYC you can look at https://www.britishfencing.com/find-fencing-events/

Sussex County U16: 28th Jan @ Burgess Hill

SE Regional (BYC QUalifier) U18: 4th & 5th Feb @ Burgess Hill

Welfare

If you feel something is not safe, please tell one of the committee members who will look to rectify it. You can talk to us during the session, or after the session via email,  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk If the issue is specifically welfare, i.e. child-related or you do not feel comfortable emailing the main email please use welfare@lewesfencingclub.org.uk  this will go directly to our Welfare Officer (Claire Cox).

Please follow us:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lewesfencingclub

Twitter: @lewesfencing

Instagram: Lewesfencingclub

If you have any questions, please do just email the club.  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.u

That just leaves us to say Happy New Year and we look forward to seeing you all soon.

Claire, Della, Gordon, Lewis and Simon

Well, that’s Term 1 done, now on to term 2.

Don’t forget you get an extra hour in bed this weekend, so we look forward to seeing you up and raring to go on Sunday the 30th

We have a seven-week term, due to Christmas falling on a Sunday we are finishing a little bit earlier than normal on the 11th of December, giving you plenty of time to do the Christmas shopping.  We are again running our Christmas social after club on the 11th a little different than previous years as we will be inside at the Dorset Arms. More details are on our FB page LINK

To remind you of our session layout:

9-10: Mini Fencers group course with Della

9-9.30: 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

9.30-10: Adults beginners courses, and if not 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

10-11: Non-electric/Steam group lesson with Della and Gordon

10-11: Teens electric group lesson with Lewis

10-11: Sparring

11-12: Sparring and 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis

1-2-1s and sparring is limited to just one court in the 9-10 session and will be offered on a first-come basis

Grading

Congrats to all who did their gradings at the end of the term, we will be handing out the certificates and badges early in Term 2.

Fees

Costs for this term are £35/£42.  Please make payment for the term asap, this can be done online here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/purchase/. PAYG is still available to people with their own kit who do not want any tuition and will just be sparring, the cost for this is £8/£10 per week. 

BFA Membership

We will be checking BFA memberships again this term so please make sure yours is up to date if you are unsure please log on to Sport 80 to confirm (https://auth.sport80.com/ & choose British Fencing), just to remind you the Club has to be a BFA member and part of that requires all our members are also part of the BFA  (If you need to change your membership you can find out more from here https://www.britishfencing.com/members/membership-info/membership-types/)

Competitions

Thank you to everyone who turned out for the Sussex County competition earlier in the month, Lewes made up over 30% of the fencers and we did well, Della came away with Gold as did Will (strictly speaking not Lewes but we will take it 🙂 ) and Fin coming in 3rd.  But to be honest we all placed well.  Here are the upcoming competitions.

Sussex Open: 26/27 November (Foils and Sabre Saturday Epee Sunday)

British Youth Championships: 28/29 January

Junior Epee: Before May 2023

SE Region Epee: July ish 2023

Its not just local that you can fence, the BFA has a list of Events around the UK here https://www.britishfencing.com/find-fencing-events/

As we know more we will update you during club time or on Facebook (see below to follow us)

COVID

The BFA has been extremely quiet on the COVID front recently, so we will continue where we left off and acknowledging your opponent at the end of the match is enough, no handshaking is required and of course if you have symptoms and think you may have COVID please do not come to the club.

Welfare
If you feel something is not safe please tell one of the committee members who will look to rectify it. You can talk to us during the session, or after the session via email,  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk If the issue is specifically welfare, ie child-related or you do not feel comfortable emailing the main email please use welfare@lewesfencingclub.org.uk  this will go directly to our Welfare Officer (Claire Cox).

Please follow us:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lewesfencingclub

Twitter: @lewesfencing

Instagram: Lewesfencingclub

If you have any questions, please do just email the club.

Claire, Della, Gordon, Lewis, and Simon.

enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk

Hi, Well summer is coming to an end, I hope you are all rested and raring to go for the new term.

Thanks to everyone who came to the social, we were blessed with great weather and food, we hope you all enjoyed it.

We start back on the 11th September, our last session before 1/2 term will be 16th October (6 wks), the sessions will be as follows

9-10: Mini Fencers group course with Della

9-9.30: 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

9.30-10: Adults beginners courses, and if not 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis and or sparring*

10-11: Non-electric group lesson with Della and Gordon

10-11: Teens electric group lesson with Lewis

10-11: Sparring

11-12: Sparring and 1-2-1 lessons with Lewis

1-2-1s and sparring is limited to just one court in the 9-10 session and will be offered on a first-come basis

Fees

Whilst the cost of living is going up, we are lucky to have been able to keep the costs the same again for this term £30/£35.  To do this we ask that you make payment for the term asap, this can be done online here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/purchase/. PAYG is still available to people with their own kit who do not want any tuition and will just be sparring, the cost for this is £8/£10 per week.  By making payment asap you are also guaranteeing space in the respective fencing group, keeping these groups full also helps us keep our costs down, we do have a waiting list which we will be emailing in the coming week, so please do not miss out and pay your fees ASAP.

Committee Members and Volunteers

We survive on people volunteering to help at the club, and this does not go unnoticed.  Helping can simply be there to layout and put away the kit and pistes, we often have a tight schedule and the quicker this is done the more time we can fence.  Or perhaps you would consider looking after a specific aspect of the club and or becoming a Committee member, the latter is not as daunting as it sounds, we normally have one or two face-to-face meetings a year, and the rest is done at the club or on a Whatsapp group.

BFA Membership

Hopefully you will have just renewed your memberships when they expired, if not or if you are unsure please log on to Sport 80 to confirm (https://auth.sport80.com/ & choose British Fencing), the Club has to be a BFA member and part of that requires all our members are also part of the BFA  (If you need to change your membership you can find out more from here https://www.britishfencing.com/members/membership-info/membership-types/)

Kit

We have had the used white kit cleaned over the summer, if you still need to borrow white kit can we ask you to come in a little bit earlier so that you can find the correct fitting items. Mums and Dads your help with this would be appreciated.

Competitions

There are a number of local competitions coming up:-

Hampshire Open: 17th September

Sussex County: 1st October

Sussex Open: 26/27 November

British Youth Championships: 28/29 January

Junior Epee: Before May 2023

SE Region Epee: July ish 2023

Details for the first two in Sussex are just appearing online, http://www.sussexfencing.org/index.php/competition-list

Its not just local that you can fence, the BFA has a list of Events around the UK here https://www.britishfencing.com/find-fencing-events/

As we know more we will update you during club time or on Facebook (see below to follow us)

Commonwealth Fencing Games

We hope you had a chance to watch some of the competitions online, I know some of you went to visit, and one of us even competed.  So well done to Juan, she came a great 25th out of 63, well done. If you did not get a chance to see any of the events live then the videos are available on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=commonwealth+fencing+championships+2022)

World Fencing Day

World Fencing Day is on the 10th September, you can find out more here https://fie.org/articles/1218

COVID

The BFA has been extremely quiet on the COVID front recently, so we will continue where we left off, and acknowledging your opponent at the end of the match is enough, no handshaking is required and of course, if you have symptoms and think you may have COVID please DO NOT come to the club.

Advanced warning of Next Terms Dates

30th Oct – 11th Dec (7 weeks)

Christmas Social on the 11th December venue TBA

Please follow us:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lewesfencingclub

Twitter: @lewesfencing

Instagram: Lewesfencingclub

Welfare
If you feel something is not safe please tell one of the committee members who will look to rectify it. You can talk to us during the session, or after the session via email,  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk If the issue is specifically welfare, ie child-related or you do not feel comfortable emailing the main email please use welfare@lewesfencingclub.org.uk  this will go directly to our Welfare Officer (Claire Cox).

We are looking forward to seeing you soon, and if you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact us.

Claire, Della, Gordon, Lewis and Simon.

enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk

Hi All

That’s the year wrapped.

Thanks to you all, we have been blown away by the support you have given the club over the last year. When we have been able to fence you have been there.  And whilst its been a strange year we have a lot to be thankful for.  We were one of the first sports allowed back in any sort of numbers, first with the under 18s and then open to all.  Competitions have been harder to arrange but we managed to have the County Epee at the centre and the Sussex Fencing Union also managed to run the open at Burgess Hill.  This competition drew lots of people in from all over the country, a sign people really wanted to get back to competing.  Lewes Fencing Club was well represented, which was good to see, including Finley coming the highest ranked under 18.

We also re worked the groups so we could extend our offering, we now have the

Mini’s, this is our group for 6-10 years olds, Claire managed to secure some funding from The Chalk Cliffe trust so we could buy some plastic kit for this group.  It runs between 9am and 10am on Sundays, as expected the numbers are currently quite low, if you have any friends with kids this age please do mention it to them. 

Steamers, this is group for 11-13yo, this group uses non electric weapons and are preparing for the next group.

Tweens and Intermediates: This group is specifically aimed at those who want regular group coaching, whilst there is no upper age limit we do expect everyone up to the age of 18 to join it.  I for one can certainly see how well people have improved by regularly joining this group.

Whilst the groups do have age brackets, they are there for initial entry requirements and we plan to move people around as they acquire the skills to fence in the upper groups. 

We run taster sessions for Mini’s and Steamers most Sundays and are starting to build up people for the 14+ beginners group, If you have any friends or families interested please get them to contact us or complete the form here.

We also wrapped our Adult beginners course on Sunday, it was good to see a nice sized group, we look forward to welcoming you back in the new year. For those of you who missed a few, don’t worry join up and we will catch you up 😀 If you have any questions about joining please just get in touch.

We had our Christmas social at the South Down Sports club, thanks to all that came, the food was again plentiful and good.

Competition

There is competition early in the new year for the younger fencers in the club, it is being held on Sunday the 16th January at the Triangle in Burgess Hill.  Entries can be made at https://allentries.co.uk/competitions/view/SCS-Y2122.  Please note you will need a BFA Competition license to fight, these are the kit requirements

Under 14 – Size 2 blades, 350N plastron, 350N breeches – Born in 2008 and 2009

Under 16 – Size 5 blades, 800N plastron, 350N breeches – Born in 2006 and 2007

More details, e.g. timings for check ins etc. will be given closer to the day.  As it is a club day, we unfortunately will not be able to have any committee there.

You will need two blades to enter the competition, and whilst we should be able to lend blades we cannot stretch to two per person, so there may need to be some sharing going on.  You will need to pick up this kit on the 9th if you are interested.

If you have any questions about entering this competition please get in touch.

Next Term

We start back on the 9th January for a 6 week term, ending on the 13th February, fees will be £36 for adults and £30 for students and concessions.  Please make payment here https://www.lewesfencingclub.org.uk/purchase/ Remember being a member gives you access to kit and also one to one coaching.

PAYG remains the same at £10 for adults and £8 for concessions per session, PAYG is only available to those with their own kit. 

The administration of the club is one of the biggest things we do so it is appreciated if you can make payment asap so that we know who is returning.

Last thing to say

Thanks again for a terrific term and we hope that you and your family have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Claire, Della, Gordon, Lewis and Simon.

Welfare
If you feel something is not safe please tell one of the committee members who will look to rectify it. You can talk to us during the session, or after the session via email,  enquiries@lewesfencingclub.org.uk . If the issue is specifically welfare, ie child-related or you do not feel comfortable emailing the main email please use welfare@lewesfencingclub.org.uk  this will go directly to our Welfare officer (Claire Cox).

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