Original: • Foil Grand Prix Torino...
On the Right, Race IMBODEN of USA. Since the end of the Season of 2017-18, Imboden has changed coach again. This time from Sergei Golubitsky to Stefano Cerioni.* I speculate that the change to Golubitsky had been to focus more on the lefty v lefty match-ups and active defence options, however, while this has worked, the new en guard position under Golubitsky also brought out new problems. In the seasons with Golubitsky, Imboden tended to drop his arm immediately off the en guard line, the higher en guard position has also made Race's marches less successful. Under Cerioni, it seems that Cerioni wanted Imboden to focus on marching again, which has led to a lower en guard position, like 2015 Race. Imboden has also tilted his hand to a thumb at 1 O'clock position - common for some Italian fencers like Cassara, Avola, Foconi, and Garozzo, (11 O'clock for right-handers) - likely to focus more on beat flicks to body on attack and defence; and allows for easier blocking of sixte line after parrying quarte.
On the Left, Edgar CHEUNG Ka Long 張家朗 of Hong Kong. Cheung won his first senior FIE major in 2016, by beating SHIKINE Takahiro in the final of the Asian Championships. Cheung then qualified for the Rio Olympics, where he lost in the Top 16 against Guilherme TOLDO. In the Season of 2016-17, Cheung won the Junior World Championships by beating SAITO Toshiya in the Final, and then won his first medal at a FIE non-Zonal senior event - Bronze at St. Petersburg 2017, then a Silver at the 2018 Hong Kong Asian Championships. In the Season of 2017-18, Cheung won Bronze at the 2017 Cairo World Cup.
*Cerioni has been the most well known foil coach for some time, having been the Head Coach of the Italian Senior Foil Teams - which won both Men's Team Gold and Women's Team Gold at the 2012 London Olympics; then the Head Coach of the Russian Senior Foil Teams - which won both Men's Team Gold and Women's Team Gold at the 2016 Rio Olympics and Rio World Championships respectively.
The commentators are Karim Bashir - someone who is almost as knowledgable about fencing as he is at commentating, a master of not speaking for minutes at a time, and when he does, it's about things that no one cares about; and Alexander Massialas - Men's Foil Fencer on Team USA, Individual Silver at Rio Olympics, and Race Imboden's teammate
These two have faced only once before a long time ago. Imboden beat Cheung at the 2014 Kazan World Championships 15/8
0:00 Bout Begins
0:49 Great counter parry (1:01 slow-mo)
1:10 Great holding parry
1:40 Great distance control
1:56 Reprise on the back to adjust for the close distance
2:07 Very nice blade actions
2:25 Distance and blade actions allows for a clean remise
2:43 Clean, confident attack in preparation
3:37 Insane if it was on target
3:46 Cheung finally successfully calls out Imboden's 70% extension defence
4:27 Imboden still insanely successful on landing his counter parries
4:36 Good adjustment for a break-time attack
4:49 Cheung finally gets two consecutive points
5:26 Almost
5:49 Perfect acceleration and distance by Cheung
6:30 Perfect punish against Cheung's relaxed march - fake search, close distance, fake search into real parry
6:48 Another perfectly distanced counter parry by Imboden
6:58 Great way to adjust to a close distance finish by Cheung
7:12 Imboden goes back to aggressive pushing
7:43 Cheung afraid of the counter parries in 4m, so Imboden can commit more to these 4m attacks than Cheung does
7:56 An action that Golubitsky, Kellner, and Dupree Race could not do