Gold medals and place in history for USA women’s foil and Switzerland men’s epee teams at World

The USA women’s foil and Swiss men’s epee teams won gold medals and became world champions the first time on an exhilarating evening at the Wuxi Sports Center Gym.

In the women’s foil, the USA beat favourites Italy to the title, going one better than the silver medal they picked up in this event last year. Going into the competition – which on this occasion had 22 national teams involved – Italy and Russia had won the last eight world championship titles in this event, with only Poland breaking the cycle as the last other country to win back in 2007.

However the omens looked promising for the USA team of two-time Olympians Lee Kiefer and Nzingha Prescod, 2012 Olympian Nicole Ross and Margaret Lu – the same four-person team that won a silver medal at the 2017 world championships – as they sailed through to the last four with victories over Spain (45-22) and Canada (45-19). They then overcame the challenge from Korea in the semi-final, winning 45-22, setting up a mouth-watering gold medal Final showdown with the top-ranked Italy.

In an enthralling battle for the gold medal, the USA foursome defeated their Italian counterparts and tournament favourites 45-35. In becoming the first American foil team to win gold at the world championships, they also dethroned their rivals who has won four of the last five senior world titles.

For their part, Italy had earlier seen off Brazil (45-12) and Japan (45-29) to reach the semi-finals where they beat France also by a 45-29 scoreline. France did have the consolation of taking the bronze medal by beating Korea, 35-26.

In the men’s team epee competition, Switzerland had won ten world championship medals in the event prior to this year, but they finally secured their first gold after a tremendous Final bout with Korea.

The Swiss quartet’s route to the Final was by no means straightforward for after a comfortable victory over Chile (45-25), they then had to survive tense encounters with first overcoming Israel 45-39 in the last 16 and then Italy by a single touch 36-35 in the quarter-finals.
That brought Switzerland up against France in the semi-final, with the odds and history perhaps leaning towards the French who had won eight of the last 11 world titles in men’s team epee, and taken the most medals in history (38) and gold medals (19) of any country.
However the Swiss prevailed in an exciting contest 45-38, meaning they would face the highly-fancied Koreans in the Final.

And what a Final it turned out to be as the Swiss shot out to an early lead, giving themselves a six point advantage at the halfway point and enough distance to force the initiative from the Koreans in the latter stages. Although Korea pulled back to within two points, the Swiss hung on and closed down the bout in the closing minute, eventually winning by 36 touches to 31.

As well as being crowned 2018 world champions, the gold medal for Switzerland means they are the only country to make the podium in this event in each of the last three world championships, whilst silver for Korea – who beat Russia 45-35 in the semi-final – adds to those they also won in the 2014 and 2015 world championships.

The bronze medal went to Russia, who beat France 45-35.

Today’s final day of competition at the 2018 World Championships sees the women’s team sabre and men’s team foil competitions.