The Background

You may recall that US Fencing has been discussing the adoption of the USA Hockey American Development Model (ADM) for youth sports for sometime.

FP first highlighted US Fencing’s intentions in May 2021 in the article Discussion on Cutting National Youth Events and “No Show” fees at NACs and shared Parent Opinions on Eliminating National Youth Tournaments shortly after that.

US Fencing delayed taking definitive action at the time on the implementation of the American Development Model (ADM) for youth sports.

The model aims to reduce stress in youth sports delaying sports specialization and competitive participation till sometime between age 15 to 17. The belief is that kids will stick around a sport a lot longer and be a lot happier if sports were more fun and less stressful.

In FP’s view, while it may be appropriate for USA Hockey to delay specialization for a hockey player till sometime after their 15th birthday, this is not true for a sport like fencing.

We understand that discussions have been ongoing at US Fencing between several committees and resource groups including the Tournament Committee, Referees Commission, Sports Performance Resource Team, Youth Resource Development Team and others about how to adopt and implement the principles of ADM to the sport of fencing.

Pushback on Cancellation of Division 2 NAC

The cancellation of Division 2 and Division 3 NACs from the 2022/2023 NAC calendar drove pushback from several fencing communities affected by the cancellation including adult fencers under age 40, and recreational fencers who enjoy participating in Division 2 and Division 3 NACs.

See: NAC Locations and Permanent NAC Changes in the New Season

As a result, we understand that US Fencing is looking at the possibility of reinstating, at least, one Division 2 NAC into the 2023/2024 NAC calendar.

We understand that the elimination of Division 3 NACs is permanent.

Note: No changes will be made to the 2022/2023 NAC calendar

Replacing Y10 at MArch NAC with Division 2

With the permanent removal of the November NAC, we understand that US Fencing has no room whatsoever to add a Division 2 NAC without removing another event.

We understand that replacing the Y10 event at the March NAC with a Division 2 event is under serious consideration at US Fencing.

This may be the best possible compromise that US Fencing can make and still achieve 2 clear goals:

1. reinstating a Division 2 NAC for a group of fencers who would otherwise have been left out in the cold for national level events, and

2. aligning US Fencing with the ADM ‘s goal of stress reduction for very young athletes with the elimination of Y10 from the March NAC.

The Y10 championship event at Summer Nationals is expected to remain in place.

At this time, FP has no knowledge if there are any discussions to eliminate the Y12 event at the March NAC, which would not be a good idea, in our view.