Jack Woods, right, poses with his Bronze medal at the Durkan Rooster Division 1A Regional Open Circuit-Region 3 Tournament held at Hackensack. He is joined by Columbia High School graduate and Harvard alum Brian Kaneshige, left, and Mateusz Kozak.
MAPLEWOOD/SOUTH ORANGE, NJ – Maplewood’s Jack Woods and South Orange’s Zander Rhodes continue to shine on the National foil fencing stage in older divisions at major tournaments, despite their age.
Rhodes, who trains with Woods – an international foil fencing champion at the V fencing club in Livingston – is following her successful trajectory in competing in these more challenging older age events and taking home the medals. Most recently Rhodes won the Silver medal at the North American Cup in Richmond, Va., when she competed in the Div 1-A Women’s A3 foil event with 66 top-level foil fencers from around the United States and Canada. She won all of her pool bouts to get top seeding, and then went on to win Silver by defeating Erika Wong from Northern California.
Rhodes, who attends South Orange Middle School, also won the Gold medal at the Thrust Fall Regional Junior Cadet Circuit Region 3 Tournament in the Cadet Women’s Foil event. She competed in this A2C3 event with 64 fencers, winning all of her initial pool bouts which seeded her at number 5 before the direct elimination bouts. She then pulled out her repertoire of advanced moves to take the Gold medal by defeating Haley Koo, also from New Jersey, in the finals, 13-9.
Meanwhile, Woods, who has been dealing with an ankle injury, won the Bronze medal at The Durkan Rooster Division 1A Regional Open Circuit-Region 3 Tournament held at Hackensack. Seventy top-level fencers competed in this Div. 1A Senior Men’s foil A4 rated open age event. This is a major event on the fencing circuit calendar. Despite his age and stature, Woods demonstrated his top fencing form and an outstanding skill-share in the initial pool bouts, to be seeded number 1 overall prior to the direct elimination bouts.
Woods was narrowly defeated by Canada’s Mateusz Kozak, 15-13, in the semifinal bout to take the Bronze medal, and missed out on meeting CHS and Harvard alum Brian Kaneshige on the final’s strip. Woods, who is now a freshman at Columbia High School, will be fencing on the foil A strip for the CHS boys’ fencing team.
Serge Vaskevich, Woods and Rhodes’ coach, said, “Jack continues to amaze us all in these older age events given the huge difference in the strength and height of his opponents. It has been more and more demanding for him physically, and he has been working through a few injuries.
“Zander is a very strong and motivated fencer and I am not surprised that she is rapidly moving from strength to strength at a level of fencing way beyond her years. Rhodes is only in eighth grade at South Orange Middle School, but is competing in Cadet and Junior events (17- and 20-years-and-under respectively.) Like Jack, I am constantly challenging her at higher level tournaments, and she is constantly surpassing our goals in these older age events. They are both more motivated to excel in more challenging events, because of their innate love of the sport and their ingrained pursuit of personal excellence.”
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