About Fencing.net
Fencing.net is an independent reference site for the Olympic sport of fencing. We exist to help people discover, enjoy, and progress in the sport — whether you found us wondering what the difference between foil, epee, and saber is, or looking up who won a medal a decade ago.
What we do today
- Guides for newcomers. Plain-English explainers on how the sport works, how to start fencing yourself, and how to find a fencing club in the US and Canada.
- Olympic fencing, event by event. Results-focused references for Paris 2024 and Tokyo 2020, and a running guide to Los Angeles 2028 as details are confirmed.
- A preserved news archive. For nearly three decades, Fencing.net reported on the sport’s news and results. We stopped publishing news in 2022, but the full archive — 1995 through 2022 — remains online, intact and searchable, as a record of the sport.
Our aim across all of it is simple: when someone asks a question about fencing, we want the clear, accurate, well-sourced answer to be here.
We no longer run our own community — the Fencing.net forums were retired in 2019 — but the sport has an active home online at Reddit’s r/fencing, which we happily recommend.
Our history
Fencing.net began in 1995, when Craig Harkins started working at a local Internet Service Provider called MindSpring. Part of every MindSpring employee’s training at the time was to learn about the Internet by creating a web page — and since fencing was (and is) Craig’s passion, a site about fencing was born.
The early site was a regular posting of old training journals, notes from tournaments and summer camps, and as much world fencing news as could be found. Soon after, photographer Serge Timacheff began providing photographs for Fencing.net’s stories. Around the site, an online community of fencers grew and took off, with forum members discussing the news of the day and giving advice to new fencers and parents.
In 2005, Craig left MindSpring/EarthLink to pursue Fencing.net full time. The company went through an ecommerce era, selling quality fencing equipment while continuing to report the latest fencing news and results.
In 2016, Craig stepped aside from day-to-day operations, passing the reins to Mitchell Lane, a contributing editor for the site and a fencer and coach of more than 15 years. The forums were retired in 2019, news publishing wound down in 2022, and the site now focuses on what lasts: the guides, the Olympic record, and the archive.
Where to start
New to the sport? Begin with Welcome to the Olympic Sport of Fencing — it explains the three weapons, right of way, and how to watch a bout.