Fencing: the Blues of silver foil in Paris on the road to reconstruction and the Olympics

Screams, tension, a supercharged penultimate relay, a Parisian public in full force to push them into Coubertin’s cooler. But in the end, a home defeat (41-45) against the Italian world champions to complete the weekend of competition at the Mazars Challenge. The Bleues du foil took silver on Sunday, but above all enjoyed a final, and the flavor of these long, successful days of team competition.

Positive emotions for a collective centered around the 2022 world champion Ysaora Thibus and her partners Pauline Ranvier and Anita Blaze. Finally. The French are coming out of several difficult weeks, with, the day after winning team silver at the World Championships in Milan in July, the more than surprising announcement of the departure of their coach Lionel Plumenail. The latter slammed the door, officially for personal reasons, from a federation under tension one year before the Paris Olympic Games.

Difficult to digest, especially for Ranvier who sees in him “almost a second father”, at his side since he was 16. And for Olympic vice-champions forced to adapt to a new staff in preparation for the Paris meeting. Yann Detienne and his deputy Guillaume Pitta arrived, with the consent of the French shooters.

Points of reference to take with new coaches

“I knew the pillars of the team,” explains the man who notably met Ysaora Thibus at the Bourg-la-Reine club (Hauts-de-Seine), “but we learned to appreciate each other on a human level. » Internships in Boulazac then in Hong Kong, more to create links and group cohesion on the way to the Grand Palais, where the fencing events of the Games will be contested, than to really work on foil.

Settings to find. As proven by this anecdote in Serbia, during the first World Cup of the season in December, where Pauline Ranvier was unable to hear the voice of her new coach on the track. “This time it was good,” smiles the person concerned. Like all processes, it takes time, but it starts to work. The proof today, with this podium. »

All that remains is for the individual results to follow. On Saturday, only Ysaora Thibus reached the round of 16 stage where she was eliminated. “We will continue to take our bearings and work,” underlines Yann Detienne, who coached the Bleues alongside Giulio Tomassini, Thibus’ coach. With a single objective: the Games. Where we will see if this group will have been able to dominate this upheaval.