Perhaps the last tournament as a semi-competitive fencer

This year's 4th of July was personally very special. Well...OK...there were some North Korean missile launches (again) on the 4th...but that's not what I had in mind - after all, it would not be like the North Koreans if they didn't do something outrageous to "commemorate" the American Independence Day.

This 4th of July was special at a very personal level - I participated in the 27th Annual Seoul Mayor's Fencing Tournament. Why is this anything special other than it was held on 4th of July? Well, I won the men's individual epee event (a first sanctioned tournament [Korea or US] win for me) at what was the last fencing tournament as a competitive fencer in Korea (that is for sure); and the tournament could also have been the last tournament for me completely (we'll see about that after I finish my physical therapy and rehab, but I doubt that I will ever compete again at any level...I'm pretty bad off...).

Don't worry...I am not hanging up my mask and weapons for good...I just won't be competing anymore. I will continue to fence (for fun) and teach.

Anyway, this may not be anything big for everyone else, but I thought it was somewhat memorable for me to mark my last tournament with a gold medal.

As for my current club - Seoul Fencing Club (SFC) - we came away from this year's Mayor's Cup with a gold and a silver in men's individual epee, a gold in men's team foil, and a gold in men's team epee. Here's a photo of the men's foil and epee teams (The first photo - or the one on the left - the the foil team) that represented the SFC at this year's Mayor's cup.

Oh, and what made the event really special for everyone from the club was that we got to take some photos with Nam Hyun-Hee, the silver medalist in women's individual foil at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

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