World's top fencers to gather for Incheon Grand Prix

The world's top foilists will assemble Friday for the 2022 Incheon Grand Prix that will be held at Namdong Gymnasium in Incheon.

Oh Sang-uk, right, in action against Luca Curatoli of Italy during their final match at the 39th Villa de Madrid Men's Sabre World Cup in Madrid, Spain, on Saturday. Oh won the gold medal while countryman Kim Jung-hwan won the bronze medal. The Korean national sabre team won the team gold medal on Sunday. [EPA/YONHAP]

The world’s top foilists will assemble Friday for the 2022 Incheon Grand Prix that will be held at Namdong Gymnasium in Incheon.

The men’s preliminary rounds will be held on Friday while the women’s preliminaries are scheduled for Saturday. The men’s and women’s elimination rounds will start Sunday morning with the semifinals and finals following later in the day.

The men’s No. 1 Cheung Ka Long of Hong Kong and women’s No. 1 Lee Kiefer of the United States headline the elite field, with a total of 121 fencers competing in the men’s event and 105 fencers competing in the women’s event.

All of the world’s top 10 foilists — No. 2 Daniele Garozzo of Italy, No. 3 Takahiro Shikine of Japan, No. 4 Alessio Foconi of Italy, No. 5 Gerek Meinhardt of the United States, No. 6 Alexander Choupenitch of the Czech Republic, No. 7 Chun Yin Ryan Choi of Hong Kong, No. 8 Alaaeldin Abouelkassem of Egypt, No. 9 Enzo Lefort of France and No. 10 Nick Itkin of the United States — are competing in the men’s event.

For the women’s event, six of the world top 10 — No. 2 Alice Volpi of Italy, No. 4 Qingyuan Chen of China, No. 6 Eleanor Harvey of Canada, No. 7 Arianna Errigo of Italy, No. 8 Leonie Ebert of Germany and No. 9 Ysaora Thibus of France — join Keifer.

A total of 40 Korean fencers, 20 men and 20 women will be competing, with No. 35 Kim Dong-su competing as the highest ranked Korean foilist in the men’s event. No. 57 Chae song-oh is the highest ranked Korean foilist in the women’s event.

Korea is growing into a fencing powerhouse, having won a total of five gold medals, three silver and eight bronze in Olympic fencing. It is tied with China as the Asian country with the most Olympic gold medals. However, Korea missed out on a foil medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, of the three disciplines in fencing — foil, sabre and épée.

BY YUN SO-HYANG [yun.sohyang@joongang.co.kr]