Wilton Trained Fencer Wins Silver at USA Fencing National Senior Championship, 1st Female to Win!

"First in CT history to win a senior-level Silver at USA Championship" Sapphira CHING Youngest USA Fencing Division I fencer and three-weapon referee from Connecticut

Wilton, Connecticut— July 17, 2018 — At the Division I Senior Women Saber Team event of USA Fencing Summer National Championship (St. Louis, Missouri), Sapphira Ching, a rising junior from Hopkins School (New Haven) ignited a new chapter in the history of saber fencing in Connecticut. She fought bouts of uphill battles alongside her teammates from California, Oregon, and Maryland to take home a Senior Women Silver medal, which marks the end of a spell of nearly three decades that no female saber fencer from Connecticut would ever win a top-three medal at any national-level USA Fencing senior events (Division I or Team).

A two-time Connecticut High School Champion, Sapphira has been fencing for four years since 7th Grade with a stellar regular-season record of 115-5. She trains at Olympian Fencing Studio (Wilton) under world-renowned Ms. Galyna Pundyk, a 2008 Olympic Gold Medalist, two-time World Champion, and two-time European Champion.

This was not the first time that Sapphira has made the Constitution State proud. In November 2017, she won a Bronze medal at Kansas City’s USA Fencing North American Cup, making her the youngest female fencer in Connecticut’s history (age 14) to earn the coveted “Division I” status from a national tournament.

In the 2015 State Games of America (“SGA”) - a biennial Olympiad-style sports extravaganza with nearly fifty sports categories and 12,000 athletes from over thirty states, she represented the Great State of Connecticut in winning two Gold and one Silver in fencing, and one Bronze in 50m Backstroke, propelling Team CT for the first time in SGA history to a Top10 State rank (in terms of medal count). A month later, she became the first Connecticut fencer to win Bronze at London’s prestigious Leon Paul International Youth Saber Tournament. In 2014 (age 11), Sapphira qualified as the youngest three-weapon referee in the history of USA Fencing. Recently, USA Fencing presented her with the 2018 All-American First Team Award and the 2018 All-Academics First Team Award,second year inrow.

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Sources:
1) Fifteen years of archived results at www.usafencing.org
2) http://stategamesofamerica.com/results2015
3) http://leonpaulfencingcentre.com/viewresults?comp_id=1069&getfile=788
4) Tom Ciccerone, Senior Leadership (since 1994) of USA Fencing Connecticut Division

Go Sapphira! Go Nutmegs!