Missing Mom at Mission

Missing Mom at Mission

By Zack Brown

Mission Fencing Club hosted an RJCC in mid-November and allowed ONLY fencers into the venue - NO coaches and NO parents. While this is the norm in Europe - where parents typically don’t accompany their kids to competitions (it’s more like a class trip for them) - it’s an experimental covid-precautionary rule here. What did people think about this tournament? Here’s a look from the perspectives of a referee, a fencer, and a parent!

Referee:

For me, the tournament was wonderful. Mission, led by Jeff and Jenny Salmon, are always on top of their game hosting quality events. I felt incredibly safe with the limited numbers. As refs, we were told to always use hand signals with our calls and not to double strip because cameras corresponded with specific pools. When spectators were allowed in the previous event, they were not permitted on the fencing floor at all, but that just ended up with close gatherings in the designated areas (not in the ref room… no one wants to hang out with us anyway). Overall, the tournament was controlled and calmer without the pressure on the fencers from coaches and parents.

Fencer:

Athletes at the event appreciated the feelings of safety and reduced stress, but at the cost of competitiveness. One fencer pointed out that, “Normally, parents and coaches yell at their fencers to encourage them, but it leads to a certain pressure to succeed.” However, she added that without that pressure, she felt less driven and motivated. Maggie Shealy, Brandeis sophomore, portrayed the setting as “ominous.” Typically, chatter between fencers flourished, but she found she didn’t approach anyone unless they were about to fence. Maggie felt a void of usual intensity: “Fencers derive a lot of their energy from spectators, fans, and teammates… without [them] cheering it’s kinda challenging to formulate some external energy.”

Parent:

Before the event, parents were informed that camera numbers would be posted online with the pool and DE assignments. This way, the whole family could watch athletes from the comfort of their cars (as comfy as a Civic can be). Luckily, an accommodating Starbucks nearby permitted all the parents to gather and use their Wi-Fi, which facilitated virtual spectating. Aria Bevacqua’s mom, Amy, was “a little apprehensive about leaving [Aria] there by herself, but the wonderful thing about the fencing community is that all the kids are so helpful and kind, and a lot of the older girls looked out for her!” I, personally, saw a similar camaraderie in the athletes and how they stepped up to be each other’s strip coaches.

Overall:

I’m always a huge fan of Mission Fencing Club and their tournaments. This radical change made me like them more for being so proactive with precautions in epidemic times. Everyone I talked to, like Amy Bevacqua, missed having coaches there, but felt the event was, “quite good and… would have no problem continuing tournaments in this way for as long as necessary.”

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4 Ways to Keep Fencing Fun and Safe in the Age of Covid

As our nation considers another round of lockdowns, we at TMFC thought we should share our list of 4 ways to keep fencing safe and fun in the age of Covid-19

Number one: Purchase athletic, reusable, washable, masks.  Brands from Adidas and Nike all the way down to the tiniest Etsy craftsman are designing better, more comfortable, more stylish masks every day.  

Number two: purchase multiple sets of masks!  Keep extra masks in fencing bags, in the car, in your gym bag or locker, wherever you have easy access to.  There is nothing worse than traveling to practice only for a mask to break, be forgotten, or left out of reach!  

Number three, and this is for coaches as well as for parents: make reminding students to cover noses and faces a matter of fact delivery – no drama aloud!  Everybody loses track of their noses from time to time, especially children.  But if being told to “cover your nose” becomes normalized, fixing a mask stops disrupting practice, keeps everyone safe, and keeps everything running smoothly.  

Number four: Make Covid specific rituals at the club.  Each ritual will have to be discovered organically and be appropriate to the look and feel of each club and community.  Personally, I have picked up my father’s penchant for over dramatization, the occasionally made up word or phrase (He loved reading Dr. Seuss to me when I was little), and self-deprecating humor.  So, perhaps unsurprisingly, I have found myself shouting made the made-up phrase: “Squirt-Squirt!” to signal time to wash hands.  “Mask break!” has replaced water break – after of course training children to walk outside and social distance before removing their masks.  And the ritual that I had the least control over: the Sabre Shake.  

The Sabre Shake was developed by our students at the club.  After I explained to a particularly bright eyed eight year old named Sophia that we don’t shake hands at the end of the bout, little Sophia took off her glove, stuck it on the end of a sabre, and offered it to me as a replacement for her hand.  Very quickly everyone in class followed suit and started offering their gloves from the end of a sabre (and within social distance parameters), and a new ritual was born.  It required a quick reminder about the importance of not waving even a gloved sabre around at an unmasked teammate – but you can understand how much fun the children had with their new habit.  

These recommendations are of course not the end all be all – they are simply a starting point for making the best of the terrible, no good, rotten virus.  But if we can turn safety practices into fun, lighthearted rituals, then we might be able to make it through the coming winter.

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