Northwest Region Fencing Win Cadet Winton Cup 2019

The Northwest Region fencing team have just won the Cadet Winton Cup 2019 for only the fourth time in the event’s thirty two year history!

Held annually at Millfield school in Somerset, this prestigious inter-regional tournament is a gruelling two day, three weapon, fencing marathon, where each region of the UK fields men’s and ladies’ cadet teams for each fencing weapon.

The region winning the largest number of matches overall is declared the tournament’s champions.

It is a particularly demanding event for the northern regions as the teams have to be ready to fence at 9am, which requires some of our fencers to wake at 4am in order to arrive on time.

They then fence all day, with the last match on Saturday not being until 9pm in the evening.

On the second day they complete the inter-regional match-ups fencing until 3pm on Sunday afternoon, making the whole event as much a test of endurance as skill! The Northwest were particularly strong this year in sabre and épée, with the men’s épée team coming first in their individual event and the ladies team winning 6 out of 9 of their matches to contribute considerably to the Northwest’s victory too.

It is a particular source of local pride that all of the lady épéeists were fencers selected from the Sefton coast area.

They were Lilly-Ann Grayson from Formby, Sophia Neophytou from Crosby and Annabelle Montagu and Grace Michell both from Southport.

Thanks must go to the Northwest Regional committee for organising the team, in particular to the region’s captain, Nicholas Murphy, for all of his hard work and also to the travelling coaches Liz Chinn (foil), Michael Swiffin (sabre) and Paul Michell (épée) for all their efforts over the weekend too.