Hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas!
The first tournament of 2015 is almost here, The 2015 Hangover Classic is Jan 3-4 at Richmond Fencing Club. Please note the fee dates as the fees go up significantly after this Sunday, Dec 28th.  $35/event with paid AskFred registration through 12/28, $75 through 1/2, and $110 for at the door registration. This one is the weekend right before we reopen. More information here: https://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=28250

Remember, tonight is the last night of Club till after the Holidays. We will reopen on Monday, January 5th. For those who can't make it  tonight, have a wonderful Christmas and we will see you in the New Year!

December notes:  Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and is ready to hop back on strip tonight!
                             We will be closed for two weeks this month for the Holidays. The last night
                             of club is Thursday, Dec 18th, we will reopen on Monday, Jan 5th.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving! And just in case anyone decides to try and work off any of those yummy calories with a bit of fencing, remember we will be closed  Thursday, Nov 27th, so you will have to wait till Monday, Dec 1st  to work them off at Club! Also congratulations to our fencers who were at the Thanksgiving Throwdown this weekend! Epee; Ed took 3rd, Bryce took 13th. Foil; Rhiannon took 3rd. Saber; Michelle took 17th! Keep up the good work! And a shout out to our friends from William & Mary, great job to all who competed (congrats to Charles on his D14 and Davis on his E14)

November notes: We will be closed on Thanksgiving, Thursday November 27th.
 The Thanksgiving Throwdown will be Nov 22-23 at Richmond Fencing Club. More info here: https://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=28128

The W&M Halloween Open is quickly approaching. It is at the student rec center on Nov 1-2 for more info look here:https://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=28058

Thank you to everyone who has donated to help purchase the "Thank you" gifts for Boys & Girls Club. We collected $490 this week! If you would like to help out we still have a week left to collect (we are collecting till Thursday, Sept 25), every little bit helps! You can do cash or check (written to HRFC) or donate online. We are excited to do something for them after all they have done for us!

We wish good luck in Fredericksburg this weekend at the 2014 Kick Off Open DIV 1A, DIV 2 ROC  to: Alex Fish, Rhiannon Harvey, Ed Setnicky, Michelle Young, and Scott Young! And a thank you to Coach Miracle for going out to strip coach this weekend.

The Boys & Girls Club Yorktown has been very good to Hampton Roads Fencing Club, giving us a home, going above and beyond to work with us, and we would like to show them some love and appreciation in return. We did a little digging and found out they need some new equipment. We are going to purchase it for them as a "Thank You", the cost will run about $1200, anyone who would like to help HRFC pay for this ( no amount is too small ) please do so by Thursday, Sept 25th.   

Remember we are closed today, Monday Sept 1. We will be back on schedule Thursday, Sept 4.  See you on the strip!

Some of you may have noticed a new face at club recently, doing a little saber fencing, and working with the fencers. We are happy to welcome Miracle to the club. 

JI Qi (Miracle) became a professional fencer in China at the age of 14. She started with epée ,then switched to saber and quickly started competing nationally with the China fencing team, winning 3 gold, 4 silver and 2 bronze medals with over 20 top ten saber China championship finishes. 

 Miracle is now available to teach private saber lessons during club hours. $25 for a 30 minute session. Please let me know if you are interested in taking a lesson/lessons. 

I am making an early September announcement: Since Labor Day this year is the first day of the months, I figured it might be wise to let everyone know before then that we will be closed on Monday, Sept 1   Hope everyone has a great end of summer!

Correction: USA Fencing has changed the price on the non-competitive membership as of the 2014-2015 season. It went from $5 to $10 . We still need everyone to renew their memberships to comply with the club insurance. Thank you!

Friday is August 1st and that brings with it the start of the new fencing season! Please renew your USA fencing memberships, we need that for insurance purposes whether you compete or not. Remember that the $5 non-competitive is sufficient for insurance purposes if you will not be doing any tournaments. https://www.railstation.org/usfencing/MembershipRegistration.aspx

Just a heads-up for those who show up early; the Boys & Girls Club switches to summer hours today, which means not only will the gate be locked when we arrive (park in the lot as usual and walk up the sidewalk), but also if you arrive before we do you won't be able to wait in the lobby or the gym for us, the doors will be locked. We have the space at 6:30, so we are always there by then (barring unforeseen traffic issues).

We have a prayer request for one of our own, Dean Giacopassi  is going in for heart surgery tomorrow, he has been having complications, so prayers would be most welcome. We pray that he has a smooth surgery and rapid recovery and we pray he will be back with us on strip this fall! God Bless and much love to you, Dean!

Happy Memorial Day! We would like to take this time to say "Thank you to all our men and women in uniform, past, present, and future. We honor those who serve with honor and cherish the memory of those who gave everything!"
In case anyone missed it, we will be closed today.

We hope everyone has a fun and safe holiday weekend! Remember we will be closed Memorial Day,  Monday, May 26th. See everyone back on strip on Thursday.

May announcements: We do have one scheduled closing for May, Memorial Day-Monday May 26th.
Congratulations to our newest class graduates: Daniel Davis, Daniel and John Hinkel, Michelle DaBell, Nicholaus Turner, and Tory Xu! We hope to see all of you on the strip!

 Remember NO CLUB tonight! We will see you Thursday.

Congrats to Bryce, Cole, Ed, Geoff, Michelle, and Rhiannon who were at the tournament this weekend! 

We hope everyone has a wonderful Easter. Remember we will be closed Monday (April 21).
 Good luck to all our fencers heading out to the Conomikes-Gutenberg Memorial Open this weekend in Williamsburg! http://askfred.net/Events/whoIsComing.php?tournament_id=25859

April announcements: Yes, we are open next week. We only have one scheduled closing this month, that is Monday, April 21st.
The  Conomikes-Gutenberg Memorial Open is this month. Apr 19, 2014 - Apr 20, 2014   It's at the College of William and Mary's Student Recreation Center. More info here:
http://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=25859

One of our club members lost a key at Club last night. It is a single key on green carabiner. If everyone could please check through their bags to make sure it didn't fall into their stuff (we are rather crammed together around the stage) we would appreciate it. If you find it, please contact me, (Tanya)  hrfencingclub@gmail.com! Thank you for your help.

We plan to place an equipment order first thing Tuesday (April 1st) morning. If you need any gear, please get us your order by Monday's club (March 31st). You can pay on-line and email us your list or you can pay at club tomorrow night (Thursday, March 27th) or Monday night.

There are two scholarship programs open to USA Fencing High School Athletes.
USA Fencing partnered with Absolute Fencing Gear to offer the USA Fencing High School All-Academic Program  and the Connor Porter memorial Scholarship. You can find information on these @ http://www.usfencing.org/page/show/1134260-scholarships-  Deadlines for applications for both of these are May 7th, 2014.

Once again we have been informed that the building will be closed due to inclement weather, and that means we have to cancel Club. So there will be NO fencing on Monday March 3rd. Hopefully it won't be as bad as they think, and we can get back on Thursday. Stay warm and stay safe.

Good luck this weekend to all our fencers heading out to River City Rumble in Richmond this weekend, Alex, Bryce, Cole, Ed, Geoff, and Scott!

We are open tonight. A few of you have inquired about tonight's class/club status due to cancellations of after-school activities. We have been told by the Boys & Girls Club that as of now they are still business as usual so we are fine to open tonight.

One of our Club members, Geoffrey Coleman, is a photographer, and he has offered to do fencing portraits for us. He would not charge a sitting fee, he would only charge for any portraits you order. We are trying to see if there would be enough interest to make it worthwhile for him to do this, so if you would be interested please let me know. If we have enough interest we will move forward on setting up a date. Thank you!

  The news for February: There are no scheduled closings this month and  hopefully no unscheduled ones either! Also,  there is a ratings rally in Richmond Feb 22-23;  River City Rumble at Richmond Fencing Club. http://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=25379   We are happy to say that we began our first beginner class last night and we are excited to welcome our new family members, they are all off to a grand start!

I have been informed that the building will be closed tomorrow, Thursday Jan 30th. This means no club tomorrow night. Hopefully this will be the last time we have to cancel for weather.

Due to the building being closed tomorrow we will NOT have club tomorrow night, Thursday Jan. 23.  Hope to see everyone Monday!

Don't forget we will be closed next Monday, Jan 20th.  Also, the NAC is this weekend at the Virginia Beach Convention Center. All kinds of vendors come out for this, so if you want a chance to see and get your hands on tons of gear (even try stuff on) and be able to ask questions, this is THE tournament to got to for that! It runs Friday-Monday all day.
Virginia Beach Convention Center 
Halls A‐D
1000 19th Street
Virginia Beach, VA 23451‐5674 
We want to wish Rhiannon and Scott good luck this weekend!

We are back on schedule tonight! Dust off the gear and get back on strip!  Don't forget the Hangover Classic is this weekend. http://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=24511  The NAC is next weekend, 17-19th in Virginia Beach it's a great one to go to look at and get your hands on gear from many different vendors. The one scheduled closing this month is on Monday the 20th, the facility is closed so we will not have club.

Happy New Year to everyone! We're looking forward to seeing all the old faces again and hoping to see many new faces in 2014! We return next Monday, Jan. 6th. Remember the first Tournament of 2014 is The Hangover Classic Tournament on Jan 11th-12th at the University of Richmond. The fee is $35 if you pay ahead on AskFred and $60 at the door, so it is worth preregistering if you know you're going! http://askfred.net/Events/moreInfo.php?tournament_id=24511