Team Canada announces fencing team for Paris 2024 Olympics
It is the largest Canadian fencing team since 1988.
The Canadian Olympic Committee and Canadian Fencing Federation announced the group of athletes selected to compete in fencing at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on Thursday, naming eleven athletes and three team replacement athletes.
It is the largest fencing team Canada has sent to the Olympics since the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, when there were fewer restrictions on how many athletes each nation could send to the Olympics.
The larger team is also due to the fact that Canada will have a men’s sabre team at the Olympics for the first time since Atlanta 1996. Canada will compete in both women’s and men’s team foil events for a second-consecutive Olympic Games, after finishing fifth and ninth in Tokyo, respectively.
These teams qualified based on the International Fencing Federation (FIE) world ranking lists, which were decided by team results from FIE World Cups, FIE World Championships and Continental Championships from April 3, 2023 to April 1, 2024.
Returning Olympians Blake Broszus and Maximilien Van Haaster headline the men’s foil team after both competing at Tokyo 2020 (and Rio 2016 in Van Haaster’s case), and are joined by Olympic debutant Daniel Gu. Gu, 25, is the son of four-time Olympian Jujie Luan, who won individual foil gold while competing for China at Los Angeles 1984 before later competing for Canada — as recently as 2008 at the age of 50.
Bogdan Hamilton is the replacement athlete for the men’s foil team.
Canada’s women’s foil team will be made up of returning Olympians Jessica Guo and Eleanor Harvey, as well as 16-year-old Yunjia Zhang. Guo, still just 18, is going to her second Olympics already, while Harvey is going to her third.
Guo won individual women’s foil gold at the 2024 FIE Junior World Championships, and also won the 2024 NCAA National Championship representing Harvard University. She has won a pair of bronze medals in World Cup events this season, in Novi Sad, Serbia and in Paris, and is currently ranked in the top ten in the world individually.
Harvey placed seventh in her Olympic debut at Rio 2016, Canada’s best-ever result in an individual fencing event, defeating the world number one in the process. Zhang won individual foil bronze at the 2024 FIE Junior World Championships in the cadet women’s category and placed sixth in the junior women’s category.
Guo and Harvey, along with Paris 2024 replacement athlete Sabrina Fang, stood together on the women’s team foil podium at Santiago 2023 last year, finishing second to the United States. Harvey also picked up a silver medal in the individual event, with Guo getting the bronze.
“It is amazing that we qualified a team again for the Paris Olympics! It was a long journey but we finally made it,” said Guo in a press release. “In Tokyo, I was the youngest on the team and my older teammates were great emotional support for my first Games. In Paris, I’ll no longer be the youngest; therefore, I want to be able to provide the same support and share my experience with my teammates.
“I am most excited to step on the Olympics stage with my teammates because the feeling of standing on the strip together will forever be unmatched. I want to leave Paris knowing I fought my hardest and tried my best, leaving with no regrets.”
Canada’s men’s sabre team will look to add Olympic success in 2024, after winning the event at the Pan Am Games in Santiago. Francois Cauchon, Shaul Gordon, and Fares Arfa were part of that gold medal effort, with Arfa and Gordon both also picking up bronze medals in the individual competition.
Gordon is heading to his second Olympics after finishing 25th in the men's individual sabre event in Tokyo, but Cauchon and Arfa are going to the Olympics for the first time. Olivier Desrosiers is the alternate athlete named to the team.
The lone Canadian competing in the women’s sabre event is Pamela Brind’Amour. After knee injuries sidelined her for much of the Tokyo 2020 qualification period, the 31-year-old will be making her Olympic debut in Paris. She has competed at three Pan Am Games for Canada, winning a silver medal at Santiago 2023 in the women’s team sabre event, and a bronze in that same event at Lima 2019.
“I’m so excited for the opportunity to represent Canada at the Olympic Games,” said Brind’Amour in a press release. “It’s always a proud feeling to represent your country. To wear the maple leaf at the Olympics is something that I dreamt of as a kid.
“Personally, my goal for the competition is to arrive hungry and ready to compete.”
Rounding out Team Canada is Nicholas Zhang, Canada’s lone entrant in men’s épée. The 17-year-old qualified for his first Olympic Games in Costa Rica earlier this month, winning the final of the FIE Pan American Zonal Qualification Event in overtime.
Zhang was the youngest male athlete on Team Canada at Santiago 2023, and won a silver medal in the men’s team épée event.
Canada has never won an Olympic medal in fencing, something they will be hoping to change in Paris. Fencing events take place from July 27 to August 4 (days one to nine of the Olympics) at the Grand Palais.
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