Fencing

I decided I was going to take an introductory Fencing class. It was a lot of fun and very intersting to learn about Fencing. One of my most favorite classes was the day we were odd numbers of students so I had the opportunity to fence against my instructor. It was nice to duel with someone who knew what they were doing. I felt like I learned more in the 5 minutes dueling with him than I had for an entire class before dueling against another student.

I am the one on the left and Cheryl is on the right.

For the most part you walk away from Fencing with minimal injury. You wear a plastic breast sheild plate to protect your chest. But when you are practicing you can't protect yourself and have to let your opponent  attack you without giving a parry. So this may result in bruises if you are hit in places the plastic doesn't cover.

These were the worst set of bruises I got from Fencing. They were tender for the first few days but now not to bad. 

Look at that nice lung which resulted in me winning the bout. So I scored the point. The important thing with a lung is to always make sure your arm is striaght before you go at your opponent otherwise your arm will get in the way.

Vaho and Martha

Vaho Iagorashvili is my instructor, he is a native of Tbilisi, Georgia, is a three-time Olympic Pentathlete and a twelve-time World Championship medalist. At the 2004 Olympics, he was the oldest athlete ever to compete in the grueling five-event sport. At 40, Vaho still managed to come in ninth. In 1988 he won the bronze medal at the Summer Olympics in Seoul. He has also competed in two Goodwill Games, earning medals three times and the gold in 1986. In 2003, he won the gold yet again at the Pan American Games