Three Boulderites: Andrea Lagan (US Fencing), Theron Haan, and Me!

Three Boulderites: Andrea Lagan (US Fencing), Theron Haan, and Me! (Check out our sweet US Fencing Pins)

I went to my first Olympic event ever yesterday. My good friend, Theron Haan, whom you might remember from a previous post, gave me call and invited me to go to the fencing (sabre) quarter and semi-finals. As it turns out, Andrea Lagan, the US Fencing Team Director of Sports Performance and a Team Manager, is also a fellow Boulderite and Theron’s ex-fencing coach. Theron and I struggled our way onto the subway at a terrible 7:30 AM to meet up with Andrea at Beijing Normal University. We took a cab from there to the Olympic Village. At that point we were bombarded with both requests for tickets and scalpers hawking their wares. I thought this was supposed to be illegal, but I guess the authorities gave up on that. We then weaved our way through empty waiting lines, and every 10 meters or so a suspiciously cheery Beijing volunteer would pipe a chipper: “Walk this way please!” Well, we were walking in that direction anyway… as you can tell, getting up at 6AM is very early for me. I was not in the best mood, even with the electric excitement of seeing my first Olympic event coursing through me.

            We took some great pictures of all of us in front of the Bird’s Nest. Andrea is a woman on a mission and getting her to stop her amazingly brisk stride was difficult. I can compare it to asking the US Fencing Team Manager to slow down and take her mind off the impending matches… We finally got to the gate when, get this, one of us lost our ticket on the way over. Andrea can be a quite forceful personality and almost talked her way into the venue without a ticket- finally we called a guy on the inside that Andrea knew. He came out to give us his extra, all while we stood fuming outside the stadium.

Fencing Stadium- US and South Africa

Fencing Stadium- US and South Africa

            The interior of the building was breathtaking. The fencing hall is an ultra-modern facility that supposedly will be used for conventions after the Olympics. (Beijing will definitely have an over-supply of “convention centers” over the next few years.) Inside, where the action takes place is cooled to a chilly 16 degrees Celsius. The fencers themselves wore the traditional white fencing garb that covers their entire body. (It’s white because before there was an electrical scoring system suits the fencers would dip their swords in ink, so a touch would be discernable. Now, the swords are electrified and create a circuit when a touch is made to light up a Green/Red light.) The first round was rather boring as the US demolished South Africa. We waited around for the semi-finals for about an hour. I had never seen fencing before, but the semi-finals was action packed awesomeness. Theron and I were on the edge of our seats as the US team went point for point with the team from Ukraine. The Chinese team battled the French on the other side of the stadium and the crowd, full of Chinese, would go wild at every point. Considering it goes to a possible 45 points per team in team events, there was a lot of screaming. The Chinese would chant “Zhonguo dui jia you” (literally, China Team Add Oil, or a better translation is “Go Team China”) every 2.5 minutes. Finally, it came down to the US team behind a staggering nine points. Our hearts pumped in unison as the final US female fencer tried to rally her team back from the back-breaking deficit. With two questionable calls by the ref (yeah, I’m biased), including the last point, the US lost. In the next three minutes the Chinese team won and the crowd let out a unified congratulatory cheer. Theron and I hung our heads- the women’s team had won the Gold, Silver and Bronze in the individual sabre events and were the Gold hopeful in the team event too. But, oh well, it was an awesome show.

            We met back up with Andrea who had been standing white-knuckled in the back of the stadium. Her emotions were palpable. It hit me then just how hard this team had trained to get to where they are now. Before Athens, the whole US fencing team had never won a Gold medal in the past 100 years, and this year they swept the podium in the individual sabre event. Their hearts had been set on proving to the world the US was finally a fencing powerhouse. It struck me then, just how much raw emotion went into winning an Olympic Gold. Lives and dreams are made and crushed over this one shiny object. I had never realized the intensity before, having always been a spectator. But standing next to this fellow Boulderite, who had experienced the Golden emotion a few days earlier but now whose best hopes was a Bronze, sent a shiver down my spine. (They did win the Bronze against France last night). It was a powerful feeling to be overcome by such raw emotional power. So, for all of us watching the Olympics far removed from the action, take a second to think of the athletes who have given everything for this one moment. Regardless of nationality, Gold, Silver, Bronze or nothing, their sacrifice for their sport and country is awe inspiring. So… this is the Olympics.

At the Stadium- Theron and Me

At the Stadium- Theron and Me

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