Gwent Sword Club fencers performed superbly at the West Wales Regional Foil held in Lampeter. The competition was organised into senior womens and mens foil, and 13-and-under mixed foil.

Peter Russell took the men's gold medal, Olivia Orchart retained the women's title she won last year and George Orchart won the youth competition.

There were good performances from other Gwent Sword competitors, too, with Abi Difford taking bronze in the women's competition, Andrew McLeod 11th in the men's and Henry Orchart 13th in the youth event.

Peter showed great determination to take the title, having been ranked eighth going into the DE stage. He won a close last-16 fight in which he had some equipment problems and landed many more hits than he actually scored. In the quarter-finals, he disposed of number-one seed James Thorneycroft - a recent visitor to our Newport club night - followed by fourth seed David Morgan in the semis before claiming his title by defeating Aberystwyth University student Allen Laing-Tuchien, the number two seed, in the final. Andrew rallied well after a slow start to be ranked tenth going into the DEs, but could not get past Cardiff's seventh seed, Rhys Cook, in the last 16.

Olivia was in superb form throughout the competition and emerged unbeaten throughout both pools and the DE, hardly dropping a point in her second pool to become number one seed and then storming through all three of her DE fights, including against Aberystwyth University's Emily Stubbs in the final. Abi, in her first senior West Wales championship, was ranked second going into the DEs, having lost just one match. Unfortunately for her, that defeat was repeated in the semi-final, although she went down fighting - 15-11 against Emily Stubbs.

George was also dominant in the youth competition, his only serious opposition coming in the form of local lad Liam Capener-Jones, whom he defeated in the final. In the same competition, Henry Orchart finished 13th of the 18 competitors - a highly creditable result as he was the youngest competitor and many of his opponents were more than four years older than him.

Article by Carl Difford

On Tuesday the 15th of November Gwent Sword Club played an away match against Howardian Sword Club in Cardiff. Gwent entered two teams against Howardian.

The Teams consisted of:

Team 1
Andrew McLeod
Abi Difford
Ceri Richards

Team 2
John Washbourne
William Pannell
John Cochrane

Team 1 defeated their Howardian counterparts 45 points to their 23. Team 2 also performed excellently reaching 45 points to the Howardian Team's 27. All our fencers performed very well and did credit to the club.

These friendly matches are not only good fun, but also a great way to experience competitive fencing. Future matches are being considered and anyone interested in branching into the competition circuit needs to discuss upcoming events with a member of the coaching team.

Abi Difford finished second in the Premier Junior Foil Series girls' under-14 Grand Prix at Esher, the final event in the 2004 series. Seeded seventh before the DEs, she knocked out both the second and third seed to reach the final.

Victory in the final - against the top-seeded girl - would have meant her winning the league outright. Although she was defeated 15-12, the result meant Abi finished runner-up in the league - to the girl she had beaten 15-3 in the quarter-finals!

Abi is pictured collecting her award from Welsh captain Mark Nelson-Griffiths, who organised the competition. Abi remains a promising young fencer who we hope will continue to in the future.

GWENT Sword Club dominated this year's Welsh intermediate competitions, from which both the Welsh champion and recent international fencers are excluded.

Of the 34 entrants, an impressive 13 were Gwent Sword members - and an even greater proportion were among the medalists.

The women's competition was a clean sweep for Gwent fencers, with Lynne Melia edging the final 13-12 over Olivia Orchart and Catherine Fisher and Abi Difford collecting the bronzes. They were well supported by Zoe Pieris, who finished 9th, and Kelly James, who was 12th but took 11 points off youth international Lucy Scourfield in her DE fight.

The men's competition was won by Rhys Melia, with Peter Russell - who was the top seed following the pools - edged out of the medals in fifth and Andrew McLeod seventh. Matt Ashton ended up 11th, Mike Edwards (nominally representing Howardian) 16th, Seb Ashton 17th and Will Pannell 21st.

On Sunday the 17th of July, Gwent Sword Club took part in a University of Wales Newport Open Day. Foil, Epee and Sabre fight were demonstrated and a small class lesson was given. Events like this stimulate general interest and attract new people to fencing. These demonstrations are particularly important as they often reach people who otherwise would have no contact with the sport. Thank you to everyone who helped out, especially Carl who did an excellent job of commentating the event.

Gwent Sword Club entered three teams for the Welsh Team Epee Championships 2005 on the 15th of May. The women's team of Lynne Melia, Catherine Fisher and Siobhan McClughan fought through the entries to win silver medals, narrowly beaten by Cardiff fencing club in a close-fought match.

In the men's teams, Gwent Sword A of Rhys and Jamie Melia, together with the rubber arms of John Washbourne fought through the two rounds to win a well-deserved bronze medal - a great achievement they will no doubt be looking to improve on next year!

Gwent Sword B (Peter Russell, Mike Kocan, Gareth Price and Andrew McLeod taking turns), having lost to Aber A, Swansea A and Cardiff B in quick succession, however pulled themselves back to beat Wrexham and Aber C. Unfortunately this wasn't quite enough to get them into the top half. They soon proved themselves to be the 'best of the rest', however, quickly defeating Llantwit, Pembroke and then Swansea B.

See the photo gallery for photos of the event.