Projected (as of 5/31/2014):
• 1129 individual and 81 team entries
• Morning events: Closing at 7:00 am instead of 8:00, 115 pools of Jr Men’s Foil (flighted), Cadet Men’s Saber (flighted), and Jr Women’s Epee (flighted)
• Later in the day: 48 pools of Y12 Men’s Epee (flighted) and Cadet Women’s Foil, plus 81 teams in Jr Women’s Saber and Jr Men’s Epee (triple-flighted through the round of 64)
• Expected end time: 11:00 pm
Actual:
Actual:
No major disasters with our monster day–just not enough referees working too many hours on not enough strips, so progress was excruciatingly slow. The Youth 12 ME finished around 10:00, the Cadet WF around 11:00, and the everlasting gobstopper of the Junior ME team competition finally ended at 1:15 am. Brutal for fencers and officials both.
There were a few mitigating factors: this was the day designated as the officials’ casual day, so most wore the polo shirts provided by the Greater Columbus CVB (though the venue was so chilly many added the usual jacket or blazer just to keep warm. Both Jeff Salmon and Becky Douville provided cookies and pound cake and other snacks at regular intervals throughout the day, which never ever hurts morale.
I crashed into my wall in the early afternoon. Brandon, my BC co-chair for this part of the week, came in around mid-day and we synced our strip planners, so that when I ceased being able to deal with the strip crunch during the transition from the morning to the afternoon events, he took over and kept things from falling apart. Our decision to always have at least two co-chairs for the difficult days proved to be a good one. (Thanks, Brandon!)
1:15 am.
Mary Griffith 
Mary,
Why did the BC not stop fencing at midnight per the rules of fencing? It seems the final bout could easily be held the next morning.
Omar
This morning we were also at capacity (more on that tomorrow, once I find out how it turns out), so we fell back upon the out provided by o.58.1, sad though that is.
o.58.1 is a rule in the chapter entitled Organization of Official FIE Competitions and does not apply to US competitions.
Also, the language about suspending the rules of fencing says:
“…they cannot decide on any departure from the Rules except when circumstances arise in which it is absolutely impossible to apply them”
Was it absolutely impossible to apply this rule, or could an event have been double flighted the next day? Other events had already been flighted, why not another?
Mary,
Why did the BC not stop fencing at midnight per the rules of fencing? It seems the final could be easily fenced in the morning.
Omar