Competitions
Competing is part of the programme at Marin Fencing Academy, not a separate track you graduate into.
Our coaches train fencers for every level the sport offers — local events twenty minutes away, regional circuits, national championships, and international competition.
Ways to take part
Most weeks
Saturday Team Events
Our own team tournaments, most Saturdays, inside the class.
We use the Saturday sessions to run our own tournaments most weeks, set up to feel like the real thing — teams of three, a proper bout order, someone refereeing, and the score on a box. A match runs to 45 touches across nine bouts, every fencer meeting every opponent, and the score carries from one bout to the next: a fencer coming on eight touches down is fencing to claw it back, not starting fresh. It is the best preparation there is for a first tournament, because the only thing missing is the travel.
- Travel
- None
- Rating
- Unrated
- Suits
- Everyone, from the first month
A few times a season
In-House Events
MFA's own tournaments, on our own strips.
A real bout order, a real DE table, and coaches you already know refereeing. It is the cheapest possible way to find out what competing feels like, because the only thing that changes is that someone is writing the scores down. MFA runs several through the season, and they are on the tournament schedule.
- Travel
- None
- Rating
- Usually unrated
- Suits
- A first taste of competing
Most weekends, somewhere
Local Events
Northern California, Central California and Mountain Valley.
Usually inside an hour's drive, and there is something on most weekends somewhere in the three divisions — the tournament schedule shows exactly how far each one is. This is where ratings start, and where a fencer meets clubs they have never fenced. Some local events also carry national qualifying points, depending on the age group and how many fencers enter, so a national season can quietly begin without anyone getting on a plane.
- Travel
- A day, usually under an hour
- Rating
- Ratings, and sometimes national points
- Suits
- A first competitive season, and mileage before bigger events
Several weekends a season
Regional
The circuits that feed the national picture.
Several weekends across a season, held all over the country — and a good number of them in California, which means a fencer can do a regional season without living on aeroplanes. Regional events carry national qualifying points, which is what makes them the step up: this is the rung where competing starts shaping a family calendar rather than fitting inside it.
- Travel
- A weekend — sometimes a drive, sometimes a flight
- Rating
- National qualifying points
- Suits
- Fencers with a local season behind them, after tougher opposition and points that count
Up to four, plus Summer Nationals
National
North American Cups and Summer Nationals.
North American Cups run up to four times across a season, all over the country, and the season finishes at Summer Nationals — the national championship, next held in June and July 2027. Most national events require a fencer to have qualified first, by accumulating national points at regional events and at the local events that carry them. It is a serious commitment of time and money, and it is where a fencer meets the full spread of the sport in one hall.
- Travel
- Several days, across the country
- Rating
- Usually requires qualifying first
- Suits
- Qualified fencers chasing a ranking or a college place
A season, in photographs
“Never lose on purpose.”
Lajos Csiszár