50 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {due west} PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF: MAXIMUM FENCING Épées and practice masks are neatly tucked away and waiting. Before joining the fray, fencers need to choose one of three disciplines: foil, épée or sabre. Maximum Fencing offers all three. “Most of the clubs offer one or two,” says Olga, explaining that here, in their downtown Los Altos location, students learn épée, while foil and sabre are taught over at their El Camino Real site. “Maybe one day we will have a separate something for sabre,” she adds hopefully. Unfamiliar with the three disciplines? Olga gives a quick rundown of their differences, starting with where fencers strike to score. “In épée, we have the whole body, even toes, feet, masks, gloves—everything,” she describes. “In foil, we have only the vest without shoulders. And in sabre, we have a target area of everything higher than the waist.” She adds, “Èpée is the easiest kind of fencing. It is the heaviest in weight and the longest in length.” It also doesn’t have “rightof-way” like the other two do, a rule stating that whoever initiates an attack gains priority in scoring. Olga once competed in épée, the sport she now teaches. “My father was a fencer. He was a pentathlon athlete,” Olga says of Do you remember watching your first cinematic sword fight? Maybe it was a duel between two nobles wielding gem-encrusted rapiers or pirates with rusted blades. After the film, you probably replayed those scenes in your head, maybe even imagined yourself holding the hilt. Good news: you don’t have to be in the movies to join the fight. “Until recently, fencing was a little niche, but recently fencing grew a lot,” says Olga Petrova of the sport’s popularity in the Bay Area. Olga runs Maximum Fencing in Los Altos with her husband, Maksym Petrov. In a few hours, the club will come alive with the clash of combat, shouts of “En garde!” and the squeak of sidestepping shoes across the floor. Flashes of silver swords. Lightning-quick thrusts and parries. But for now, the facility is quiet, the wall-mounted electronic scoring boxes switched off, their attached bodycords dangling. words by JOHANNA HARLOW FENCING sword play
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