MEDIA RELEASE
3 December 2023
NORTH MELBOURNE – Western Australian fencer Ned Fitzgerald yesterday won the Australian and Oceania Men’s Foil event at the 2023 Australian and Oceania Senior, Veteran, and Australian Youth Circuit Fencing Championships.
“I started [fencing] ages ago, when I was 9 years old, and I always say it was a cinematic inspiration,” he said. “I watched a lot of Star Wars, Pirates of the Caribbean, blades and swords. My brother and I had a park near our house and we used to muck around with toy lightsabers. I saw an ad for fencing pop up because of the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne in 2006 and I just thought I’d give it a try – it was between that and archery, and Mum and Dad said, ‘Let’s do fencing,’ probably because it’s more active.”
After a move to Western Australia and the disruption of the pandemic, he’s now considering moving to Europe with his partner to be closer to more international competitions. “I used to be very heavy on the international competition, nine or ten comps a year during school and uni. If [the move] happens, that’ll be right around the time of the Paris Olympics, so there’ll be another four-year cycle to go.”
When asked what he thinks is going well in Australian fencing, he laughed: “A bit of conflict of interest here, because I’m on the board of the [Australian Fencing Federation]. But I really think that the High Performance Program has been completely reworked compared to what it was a few years ago. Now it’s a lot more welcoming, and it’s creating this groundswell of competition at the intermediate level: the teenagers who are going to the competitions and competing against each other – and there’s a lot of them! I had the experience today of fencing some of them, and I’ll tell you what, it was scary! The ones who stay with it, and then go overseas and get experience there as well, that’s how they improve and rise to a higher level than where they are now.”
He added, “I’d like to thank Mum and Dad for the 17 years of support that’s led up to now, they’ve been there the whole time. My partner has been incredibly supportive as well.”
Results for each event are being posted in real time at
https://www.fencingtimelive.com/tournaments/eventSchedule/8284EE098F63431FA0F03B468EE30E0A#today
The 2023 Australian and Oceania Senior, Veteran, and Australian Youth Circuit Fencing Championships continue through Tuesday, 5 December. Photo and interview opportunities with competitors will be available throughout the competition.
Photo credit: Ed Chiu
For more information
Laura E. Goodin
Media Officer
media@fencingvictoria.org
