Sophie Williams Blog

Junior World Championships in Jordan

I have just returned from the Junior World Championships held in Jordan, and although they weren’t hugely successful for me, it was a fantastic championships for the British Team as a whole.
I flew out a few days early, to give me some time to acclimatise and also have some extra training. The individual event was held on Saturday and I was ranked 11th going into the competition. Unfortunately I didn’t have the best start in the competition, only winning three of the five poule fights, but it’s the knockout rounds where it really counts.
My Last 64 fight was against Kindler (GER) a very promising German cadet who has made finals at some Junior World Cup events, not the nicest first draw to have, but I fenced strongly to win comfortably 15-8. My next fight was against the number two seed, Taharo (FRA). I had never fenced her before but the French always have strong fencers. It was a difficult match, and I was losing 14-11, before pulling back to win 15-14. Now I was through to the Last 16 against Petraglia (ITA) who I have won against plenty this season, but unfortunately I didn’t quite have the edge on the day and lost 15-12. My final position in the competition was 14th, which was a little disappointing but it did move my world ranking up to 11th. Although the result wasn’t quite as good as hoped, the way I fenced is very promising for the senior events this season.
However, the team event was still to come and we were seeded 5th out of 16 teams. We drew Germany in the first round, which wasn’t the best draw to have, considering our ranking, but winnable none the less. I fenced a good match but unfortunately it wasn’t quite enough to win, and we lost 45-43 in the end. So we finished 9th in the team competition, not what I was hoping to achieve in my final year of Juniors but I can’t be too disappointed in the way I fenced.
The competition was a big success for the British team because for the first time since 1976, we had a Junior World Champion. It was won by Philip Marsh in the Men’s Epee event and really demonstrates how much the standard of fencing is improving in Britain. I now have a bit of rest before getting back into training for the Olympic qualification season, starting next month.