(Colorado Springs, Colo.) – Ryan Estep (Florence, Miss.) and Gary Van Der Wege (Kyle, Texas) will compete in the men’s epee events on Wednesday – the second day of wheelchair fencing competition at the Paralympic Games in London.
Ranked #3 in the world in the men’s Category B epee event, Estep will open his pool with a bout against Jose Palavecino (ARG) after which he will fence Alim Latreche (FRA) who won bronze in the foil event on Tuesday and defeated Estep in the quarter-finals of the Wheelchair Worlds in 2011. Estep’s final bouts will pit him against Ali Amar (IRQ) and Chik Sum Tam (HKG).
Category A fencer Van Der Wege, who will be competing in his first World level event since the 2004 Paralympic Games, will fence 2011 Wheelchair World medalist Andrii Demchuk (UKR) in the first round of the pools. Van Der Wege’s next bouts pit him against Tamasz Juhasz (HUN), Artur Yupov (RUS) and 2011 Wheelchair World medalist Matteo Betti (ITA).
Fifty-seven-year-old Van Der Wege plans on using his years of experience to his advantage on Wednesday.
“My axiom is 'old age and treachery will defeat youth and exuberance.’ You have to be cunning in fencing – that's the motto for the over-fifty contingent,” said Van Der Wege who admitted that a lot has changed since his last Games in Athens. “There's lots more countries now and the competition is harder. The Games have grown tremendously. There's so many competitors I don't know. I'm going in with a fresh mind.”
From the pools, the fields in both the men’s epee events will be cut to a table of 16.
The competition schedule is as follows (All Times Local):
9:30 a.m.
Men’s Category A Epee Pools
Women’s Category A Epee Pools
Women’s Category B Epee Pools
Noon
Men’s Category A Epee Table of 16
Men’s Category B Epee Pools
1 p.m.
Women’s Category A Epee Quarter-finals
1:30 p.m.
Women’s Category B Epee Quarter-finals
2:30 p.m.
Men’s Category A Epee Quarter-finals
3 p.m.
Men’s Category B Epee Table of 16
3:45 p.m.
Men’s Category B Epee Quarter-finals
5:45 p.m.
Men’s Category A Epee Semifinals
Women’s Category A Epee Semifinals
Men’s Category B Epee Semifinals
Women’s Category B Epee Semifinals
6:30 p.m.
Men’s Category A Epee Finals
Women’s Category A Epee Finals
Men’s Category B Epee Finals
Women’s Category B Epee Finals
Visit www.paralympic.org for the complete schedule of which events will be streamed live from London.
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