Background
This will be the 23rd appearance of the event, which has been held at every Summer Olympics since women's fencing was introduced in 1924.
The reigning Olympic champion is Inna Deriglazova of Russia. She is also the reigning (2019) World Champion, with 2015 and 2017 World Championship wins as well. A preview from Olympics.com identified Deriglazova as the top star on a strong Russian fencing team. [3] Lee Kiefer, who did not reach the finals in the previous Olympics in 2012 and 2016, made history as the first American to win an individual gold medal in foil fencing, and she is the second woman to achieve this, following Mariel Zagunis, a five-time Olympian and two-time gold medalist in women's sabre.
Qualification
A National Olympic Committee (NOC) could enter up to 3 qualified fencers in the women's foil. Nations were limited to three fencers each from 1928 to 2004. However, the 2008 Games introduced a rotation of women's team fencing events with one weapon left off each Games; the individual event without a corresponding team event had the number of fencers per nation reduced to two. Women's foil was the third event this applied to, so each nation could enter a maximum of two fencers in the event in 2016. The 2020 Games eliminated this rotation and all weapons had team events. [2]
There are 34 dedicated quota spots for women's foil. The first 24 spots go to the 3 members of each of the 8 qualified teams in the team foil event. Next, 6 more men are selected from the world rankings based on continents: 2 from Europe, 1 from the Americas, 2 from Asia/Oceania, and 1 from Africa. Finally, 4 spots are allocated by continental qualifying events: 1 from Europe, 1 from the Americas, 1 from Asia/Oceania, and 1 from Africa. Each nation can earn only one spot through rankings or events. [2]
Additionally, there are 8 host/invitational spots that can be spread throughout the various fencing events. [2] Japan did not use any host places in women's foil.
The COVID-19 pandemic delayed many of the events for qualifying for fencing, moving the close of the rankings period back to April 5, 2021, rather than the original April 4, 2020. [2] [4]
This page is based on this
Wikipedia article Text is available under the
CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
