Fencing: Kruse begins season with Foil World Cup gold

North London foilist Kruse, who is ranked number two in the world and trains with ZFW head coach and founder Ziemek Wojciechowski, was in fine form throughout as nearly 240 fencers competed.

The senior member of a 12-strong Great Britain squad, including ZFW’s Dominic De Almeida, Kruse went into the knockout stages thanks to his ranking.

And the 35-year-old beat rivals from Belgium, France and the United States before meeting seasoned Italian competitor Andrea Cassara on the finals piste.

Cassara held a slight lead early in the match until Kruse adjusted his tactics to gain the upper hand and dominated to win 15-11.

Four-time GB Olympian Kruse was satisfied with the result, with Bonn the only World Cup competition where he had not previously won a podium place.

In addition to correcting that situation at the outset of the international season, Kruse’s win pushed his tally to eight World Cup victories.

Wojciechowski, who has coached Kruse since the age of nine, felt the victory showed the depths of Kruse’s skills, saying. “It is incredible to see yet another dimension of Richard’s mastery in defence. The performance was full of a variety of actions from the so-called point in line (this involves a straight arm with the point of the fencing foil threatening the opponent’s target area), which Richard recently developed.”

De Almeida, the youngster among the senior GB men’s foil squad, finished in 72nd place and the international men’s foil fencing season continues with the next major competitions in Paris and Tokyo early in 2019.

ZFW is run by Olympic coach Wojciechowski and a team of experts, aiming to boost the standard of fencing in Britain as a centre of excellence for elite fencers training for Olympic, international and national teams.

It also provides a learning programme with an emphasis on youngsters at various venues in North London and the capital. See zfw-fencing.co.uk for more.