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Permalink Reply by Lars Hansen on August 10, 2012 at 7:37am

I don't know, most of us are not "elite" athletes :).

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Permalink Reply by Donna Sanfilippo on August 10, 2012 at 9:05am

I feel that USFA needs to do more for the Elite Athletes by reaching out to sponsors to help support the whole fencing team. It is too fractured some get some don't. One set of rules for everyone. It is a crime that you guys fly coach to the Olympics. A non USFA board member had to call  the airlines and ask that you get better seating. The corporate community can support the Elite Athletes better but they need to be asked. A marketing plan that is aggressive. A value placed on the sport .

The grassroots of the USFA needs better support also. I believe that with the new leadership and direction that this can be accomplished.

Just my view from the outside looking in.

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Permalink Reply by Daryl Homer on August 10, 2012 at 2:38pm

I agree with you completely! The question is how can we do this with the current structure. Unfortunately new leadership can get very little done, without changing the existing structure and culture.

Donna Sanfilippo said:

I feel that USFA needs to do more for the Elite Athletes by reaching out to sponsors to help support the whole fencing team. It is too fractured some get some don't. One set of rules for everyone. It is a crime that you guys fly coach to the Olympics. A non USFA board member had to call  the airlines and ask that you get better seating. The corporate community can support the Elite Athletes better but they need to be asked. A marketing plan that is aggressive. A value placed on the sport .

The grassroots of the USFA needs better support also. I believe that with the new leadership and direction that this can be accomplished.

Just my view from the outside looking in.

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Permalink Reply by Donna Sanfilippo on August 11, 2012 at 8:26am

Easier said then done if there is no sense of great need for change. Companies lend there name to sponsor the national team. There are many ways to accomplish this it can be done like car racing put ads on Warm up Jkts or Heck I'm soul less put ads on the pants. Other countries have sponsor ads on the
 teams uniforms.

"Do or Do Not there is No Try " Yoda had it right. If they want to raise funds it is just marketing 101.

Daryl Homer sncir feaid:

I agree with you completely! The question is how can we do this with the current structure. Unfortunately new leadership can get very little done, without changing the existing structure and culture.

Donna Sanfilippo said:

I feel that USFA needs to do more for the Elite Athletes by reaching out to sponsors to help support the whole fencing team. It is too fractured some get some don't. One set of rules for everyone. It is a crime that you guys fly coach to the Olympics. A non USFA board member had to call  the airlines and ask that you get better seating. The corporate community can support the Elite Athletes better but they need to be asked. A marketing plan that is aggressive. A value placed on the sport .

The grassroots of the USFA needs better support also. I believe that with the new leadership and direction that this can be accomplished.

Just my view from the outside looking in.

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Permalink Reply by Walter G. Green III on August 11, 2012 at 9:09am

This is a very complex question that the fencing community has failed to address adequately over the entire 47 years I have been engaged with the sport.  The most basic form of support for elite athletes is creating them, and that is a purely demographic and publicity problem.  If an aspiring athlete with the right combination of genetics, motivation, and parental support does not walk into my Salle, I cannot create an elite athlete.  We have a large enough population in the United States to create a large population of elites in our sport.  But our sport remains essentially stagnant in growth - yes, I know there are a lot more fencers now than when I started in 1965.  But the growth in other sports has been geometric - consider soccer and the wide range of martial arts as an example.  Both of those were in essentially the same place as fencing was in 1965, and now their participants number in the several hundreds of thousands.  Fencers, fencing clubs, and our national organization do not effectively promote our sport.

The second part is coaching.  Coaching at the elite level is not the problem - the problem is inadequate developmental coaching.  Anyone can be a fencing coach - no knowledge of modern training methods in sports, how the body works, etc. is required, and no current knowledge of fencing is required.  You see the results when you go to a division level tournament in much of the country - athletes who warm up in ways that are ineffective and even dangerous, poorly managed psychological responses to the bout, lack of body and movement control on the strip, etc.  And you see the results in low quality refereeing, which exacerbates the problem of bad fencing.  And yes, I know none of this happens in your division, but it does happen widely.

And finally we have built a culture in which recreational fencers are despised in many clubs.  Look at the galaxy of people who play golf, tennis, etc.  What percentage of them are serious competitors?  A tiny percentage.  And yet, if you don't hold a classification and fence purely electric many clubs simply do not want you.  And yes, I know it never happens this way in your club, but ...  The result is that we do not develop a large base of people who know what fencing is, appreciate it, want to watch fencing on television, etc.

And absent that audience, what sponsor is willing to spend money supporting something for which there is no demand?   Absent that demand, which club is going to spend the money to get continuing education for its coaches?  Absent that demand which coach is going to be willing to spend the time and money to measure their skills against the standard of certification?  And absent the support from sponsors, how do more young people learn that fencing even exists in their community? 

The problem is not supporting elite athletes - although when I look at what other countries do for their elites, it is obvious that we will become less competitive internationally over the next decade.  The problem is that we have to grow our sport in a modern way if we are to remain competitive.  More fencers means more demand which means more support which in turn means more success.

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Permalink Reply by Daryl Homer on August 11, 2012 at 11:17am

Walter Love your response! Now how do we go about changing this!

Walter G. Green III said:

This is a very complex question that the fencing community has failed to address adequately over the entire 47 years I have been engaged with the sport.  The most basic form of support for elite athletes is creating them, and that is a purely demographic and publicity problem.  If an aspiring athlete with the right combination of genetics, motivation, and parental support does not walk into my Salle, I cannot create an elite athlete.  We have a large enough population in the United States to create a large population of elites in our sport.  But our sport remains essentially stagnant in growth - yes, I know there are a lot more fencers now than when I started in 1965.  But the growth in other sports has been geometric - consider soccer and the wide range of martial arts as an example.  Both of those were in essentially the same place as fencing was in 1965, and now their participants number in the several hundreds of thousands.  Fencers, fencing clubs, and our national organization do not effectively promote our sport.

The second part is coaching.  Coaching at the elite level is not the problem - the problem is inadequate developmental coaching.  Anyone can be a fencing coach - no knowledge of modern training methods in sports, how the body works, etc. is required, and no current knowledge of fencing is required.  You see the results when you go to a division level tournament in much of the country - athletes who warm up in ways that are ineffective and even dangerous, poorly managed psychological responses to the bout, lack of body and movement control on the strip, etc.  And you see the results in low quality refereeing, which exacerbates the problem of bad fencing.  And yes, I know none of this happens in your division, but it does happen widely.

And finally we have built a culture in which recreational fencers are despised in many clubs.  Look at the galaxy of people who play golf, tennis, etc.  What percentage of them are serious competitors?  A tiny percentage.  And yet, if you don't hold a classification and fence purely electric many clubs simply do not want you.  And yes, I know it never happens this way in your club, but ...  The result is that we do not develop a large base of people who know what fencing is, appreciate it, want to watch fencing on television, etc.

And absent that audience, what sponsor is willing to spend money supporting something for which there is no demand?   Absent that demand, which club is going to spend the money to get continuing education for its coaches?  Absent that demand which coach is going to be willing to spend the time and money to measure their skills against the standard of certification?  And absent the support from sponsors, how do more young people learn that fencing even exists in their community? 

The problem is not supporting elite athletes - although when I look at what other countries do for their elites, it is obvious that we will become less competitive internationally over the next decade.  The problem is that we have to grow our sport in a modern way if we are to remain competitive.  More fencers means more demand which means more support which in turn means more success.

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Permalink Reply by Walter G. Green III on August 11, 2012 at 9:35pm

There is no easy answer.  First, people in the sport have to understand there is a problem.  I suspect that most fencers do not know who our elite athletes are, do not care, and do not understand the overall importance of international success to the sport.   As long as they can come to the club once a week, go to a tournament every so often, and tell people they are a fencer, they are happy.

This is complicated by the natural resistance to change you find in any organization, especially in organizations where there are large numbers of people with vested interest in resisting change.  I still see statements like "we don't want more fencers,"  "this is an elite sport and we need to keep it that way," "we don't want your kind here," "I don't want the sport to be popular because ...," etc.

Second, people have to commit to change, not just some people, but a lot of people.  The change has to be clearly articulated so that people understand why we need to change.  We have to make people care, and I am not sure that there are a whole lot of people who do care.

Our fencers need to understand what television audience means to a sport's continued place in the Olympics.  At some point the IOC will decide that extreme sports generate more audience and more aadvertising revenue.  And we need to understand that people watch sports that they did.  Every guy in the recliner with a six pack and giant bag of chips on Sunday afternoon, knows that he could have been the quarterback.  If he hadn't had to drop out of football for X reason, he would have been a star.  So we need people who can watch fencing because they have done fencing.  In other words we need more beginners, more recreational fencers, more classical fencers, more students of historical swordplay - and we need all of them to feel welcome in our fencing clubs.  Without the Olympics fencing is in real trouble.

Third, we have to fix the developmental coaching problem.  The idea that one is a professional member of USA Fencing because you paid for insurance is a first step, even if ludicrously small.  But USA Fencing needs to implement a basic coaching certificate as a requirement for that professional membership.  Call it a D Certificate (for developmental), put out study material, and have a written test, much as the 10 Referee classification used to be.  No one should be a "professional" coach if they do not know the basic rules, basic terminology, and basic theory of the sport.

Above that USA Fencing should use the proven existing mechanism for certification of coaches - the US Fencing Coaches Association has a well developed coaching certification program that ensures people who hold certificates are well qualified.  In addition, USFCA has a new national training program for coaches that is designed to teach a standard curriculum to prepare candidates for certification.  USA Fencing does not need to be reinventing the wheel.

This is critical.  Without a body of compentent coaches we waste and even hold back the efforts of our fencers.  And since referees usually were fencers, the poorly trained fencers become referees who cannot recognize that a sabre parry 5 and riposte is not the attacker's bind (yes, actual call).

And then USA Fencing has to solve the marketing problem.  I can market my Salle, but I am swimming against the tide of other sports when there is no effective national level marketing push.  And some of this is absurd.  Go to a NAC sometime, and see if anyone in the city knows there is a national level tournament in town.  Try to find something that advertises the event.  Try to even find markings on the venue that identify that a fencing meet is in progress.  Walk in and see if there is anyone to greet you and explain what is happening - Walmart does this, why not fencing?

Finally, we badly need leadership that is interested in developing the sport, not just keeping it a small pond in which the right people can be big fish.  We need to study what other sports have done to develop and expand.  We need degreed, experienced, sports management professionals in our national office.  We need people managing the money who have association money management backgrounds.  And we need clear goals - not just that we will answer the phone each day, but stretch goals people can believe in, be inspired by, and work toward.

Can we do all of these things - I hope so, because I think we have to, or accept that we have reached and passed the high watermark of American Fencing.  I do want to say that in my opinion our coaches and our fencers did an outstanding job in London - unfortunately they were on the receiving end of the front of the wave of a new order.  These Olympics are probably the turning point in who controls the medals of the future, and we have a real challenge to get back in the game. 

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Permalink Reply by Lars Hansen on August 12, 2012 at 7:53pm

Some have said that the letter rating system contributes to this.  Do you think it is elitist?

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Permalink Reply by Eric Mitton on August 16, 2012 at 9:12pm

The best thing the USFA could do is grow the sport.  This benefits everyone.  Elite fencers find it easier to get sponsors (if fencing is a bigger deal in the USA, more companies will be willing to sponsor elite fencers), and the rest of us will have more local competition, more financially-secure clubs, etc.

If the sport is not expanded, it becomes a zero-sum game.  In order for more resources to be diverted to attracting sponsors for elite fencers, dues for low-level fencers have to be increased, or funding for other ventures has to be cut to free up the funds.

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