Fencing: Ukraine’ women fencing team win country’s first gold

Lee Kiefer from team USA Fencing. GETTY IMAGES

Today was Team Ukraine’s day as they won their first gold medal of the Paris Olympics with a victory in the women’s sabre team competition. They triumphed over South Korea 45-42 in the final at the Grand Palais. Japan secured the bronze medal by defeating France 45-40.

President Volodymyr Zelensky stated in a social media message that the gold medal showed “that Ukrainians are winning!” He added, “We are cheering for our people and supporting them with the whole country.”

The Ukrainian team has high hopes of adding a second gold on Sunday when Yaroslava Mahuchikh competes in the women’s high jump, just weeks after setting a new world record of 2.10m. With the war with Russia raging at home, many Ukrainian athletes have prepared for the Olympics in training camps abroad.

The United States women continued to reign supreme in the foil fencing competition on 1 July, adding team gold to the individual silver and gold they won earlier this week. They have become the first-ever American team, male or female, to win the gold medal in the team competition.

It was on day six (1 August) of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 that the four women made history inside of the iconic Grand Palais by beating Italy’s women 45-39, with Italy upgrading the medal they took at Tokyo 2020 from bronze to silver.

The final got off to an exciting start with the USA’s back-to-back reigning champion, Lee Kiefer, and Italy’s Arianna Errigo making a combined seven hits within the first minute of competition. This tied the score at 4-4 before Kiefer put the United States in the lead at the first changeover.

USA’s Lauren Scruggs began to pull away from the Italians, finishing five points ahead at the second changeover. Other than a brief 12-12 tie, the United States maintained their lead over Italy until the end. “I’m just very shocked. I have honestly no words to describe it,” Scruggs said after accepting the gold. “It’s super cool to make history. It’s unbelievable to make history. I’m just very, very shocked right now. I don’t have a lot of words to describe it.”

Italy’s Arianna Errigo gave birth to twins just over a year ago, and tonight she will stand on the Olympic podium with a silver medal around her neck. Japan took the bronze medal over Canada in a close contest that ended with a score of 33-32.

Men’s Gold medal 

Hungary won the gold medal in men’s team epee fencing at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on July 2. This was Hungary’s fourth time winning the men’s team epee event at the Olympics, with their last title in 1972. In total, 12 gold-medal events in epee, foil, and sabre individual and team competitions are being held from 27 July to 4 August at the Grand Palais. In the semifinal round, Japan won against Czechia 45-37, while Hungary defeated France 45-30. Czechia won the bronze medal over France 43-41.

“I knew there was something special about the team event,” said Hungary’s Gergely Siklosi. “We worked a lot these past months and were absolutely ready for this challenge. We had different strategies for each team, and against Japan we knew they wanted to use defensive tactics, so we had to attack them. It was crucial that we had the lead. Still, they managed to equalize it. This event and venue have been on our minds since being announced, and the Grand Palais is the most beautiful place I have ever fenced in my life.”



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