Fencer Quotes

We still have a long way to go. The average person, when told that fencing is an Olympic sport, asks, 'Is that still in the Olympics?' It's been in every Olympics there has ever been in the modern age. There's fencing in every summer Olympics and it never gets televised. There's no fencer who is a household name. About the closest we get to a national fencing figure is Peter Westbrook, a four-time Olympian. - Dion Shively

Top to bottom, this is a very balanced team. We have great fencers in every event. - Dave Micahnik

They're near the best of their weapon and they have the experience from years on the strip. So they have everything it takes to be the complete fencer. - Amy Orlando

That is quite a challenge. The task is to not only qualify a full number of fencers for nationals, but to get used to the different qualifying system they are using this year. - Emmanuil Kaidanov

Sport fencing is very different from what you see in movies. In fencing, the moves are small and tricky. In the movies, the moves are big and flashy. They're meant to show well before the camera. Actors are trying to look good and not hit somebody. Fencers are trying to hide what we're doing and hit somebody. We try to look good at what we do, but we don't want to telegraph any big, flashy moves because that makes it easier for your opponent to hit you. There has to be a certain subtlety to it. - Dion Shively

I've been there and have a good sense of what I'm talking about. I want [the fencers] to take advantage of what I have to offer. - Nikki Franke

In fencing, weight & strength mean nothingThe fencer need only know when, how and where he must thrust his blade. - Aldo Nadi

I named it the Zen Fencing Academy for my hero, a gentleman by the name of Joe Odom, who sadly passed away last year. He was my role model as a fencer and as an instructor. He founded a club in Pittsburgh, Fencers For Fun, as a method of keeping kids off the streets. He always came to (Indiana University of Pennsylvania) to help us out because we didn't have a coach. We always referred to him as the 'Zen master of fencing'. He was that wise old Pat Morita kind of character. - Dion Shively