"Touché And Away!"
 

Rufus: Did you ever see this guy fence? He's the only famous fencer that I know.

http://thm-a02.yimg.com/image/b32fca9c22389060

Don't know this one?

http://keenanmorrison.files.wordpres...igomontoya.jpg

Being an official in three sports (football, basketball, and slow-pitch softball), I sometimes get asked to officiate stuff at parties that sometimes can be a bit tawdry. Boy, those bikini-clad oil wrestling chicks can be fun to officiate. ;)

With Apologies To Senator Lloyd Bentsen ...
 

"Ref Ump Welsch, I served with Mark Padgett, I knew Mark Padgett, Mark Padgett was a friend of mine. Ref Ump Welsch, you're no Mark Padgett".

Rufus,

I would have never expected to meet a former fencing official in basketball officiating forum! :)

I was a fencer in high school for three years (though one year was cut short due to injury). I was never all that good though I made it to our "All-City" tournament in my junior year. I was eliminated in the first round but hung tough against one of the top fencers in our league. That garnered me the "Most Improved Player" award from my coach. My coach was actually a former Olympic champion fencer. One of my teammates was Olga Chernyak who got a scholarship to fencing power Penn State and was a Division I individual champion her sophomore year.

Check out my team in my senior year:

http://www.angelfire.com/ca2/smcoach...ths-fen_92.jpg

My former coach asked me officiate fencing a few years back but the matches were in the afternoon when I was still working.

Thanks to you, I remember a lot of how the officials handled our matches back in high school. When I think back to it, it was pretty interesting that the matches were stopped by the official to figure out the scoring.

Imagine if this were applied to basketball:

Whistle blow and players stop

Officials announces to all players:

Player drove baseline
Defender stepped in and clipped offensive player on hip
Therefore the call is a BLOCK!

Thanks for the memories of my high school days. I can't remember any matches that stood out but those were some interesting days!

Coach41
Tried to send an IM but it didn't work for some reason.

Thanks for the post, it's nice to meet a fellow, if former for us both, blade handler. I fenced mostly foil but dabbled in epee and saber enough to realize that I didn't like either one.

I fenced with a brother combo who graduated Penn State as well. Highlight of my career was beating one of them in an open tournament (only to have his brother annihilate me in the next bout). Oh well, fame is fleeting on the strip, or something.

Take care and thanks for the photo. I've got some hanging around somewhere that I'll have to dig up now.

And you're the one on the far right? :confused:

Mark - Far right?? I'm Definitely not the girl. :D

Our head coach is the guy in dark trench coat. To the left of the head coach is the very TALL GUY. To the left of the TALL GUY is me. :)

Rufus,

Forgot to respond to you as well. It is indeed good to see a fellow fencer out there. While not a well known sport, there are a ton of fencers out there. In high school, I think they only had foil so that's what I did for three seasons.

In some ways, I wish I would have stuck with fencing a little more. After high school, I took to basketball and have stayed with it since. I play a little golf and badminton along the way.

I still have my old fencing equipment that I purchased back in high school (better than using the school provided stuff). I pulled out the foil a few years back and put on my Zorro costume for Halloween. :)

I took a fencing class my freshman year of college and enjoyed it, except for the fact my instructor was a very unpleasant individual to be around. I also learned I wasn't very good. :o

Coach, I noticed you're in the Bay Area. I just moved from Martinez about a month ago. Enjoying the cooler weather? :)

Welpe,

I live in SF and love the cooler weather. I'm a fan of the breeze and being able to take walks around. I'm not a big fan of extreme weather (hot or cold). I don't particularly understand some friends who live in the East Coast where you can snow and extremely cold weather or other places which are real hot.

I guess you're in Texas now. I visited Plano some years back because I worked for SBC (now AT&T). I'd love to come back eventually (one of my old bosses is still in Texas).