From our special correspondent in Tokyo,
Too bad the IOC has a bit more self-esteem than Fifa and does not push for the Summer Olympics every two years. Because to cover fencing, frankly, what a fuss. The results, of course, but especially the athletes. Another good slice of fun with the sabers, an hour after the unfinished score against the Russians. We are trying to unravel the secret of the French women’s saber, a double medalist in Tokyo after years and years of chasing the carrot. And this, in spite of Anne-Lise Touya or Léonore Perrus, “all these great champions who built the saber before us,” recalls Cécilia Berder.
“We must see our training, we are killers”
Well imagine that the recipe for happiness, for our sabers (Cécilia Berder, Manon Brunet, Charlotte Lembach, Sarah Balzer), must cost 20 balls in the local decathlon. It’s called spikeball, a game we didn’t know existed until the four of us touched a word about it: ” It’s a game a bit like volleyball with a two-on-two net. We don’t let go, we are together, we carry a chouïa, but we arrive an hour before training to be able to do that. We created an identity there. “
An identity where each point is disputed like the last touch of an Olympic final: “You have to see our training, ensure Berder. We’re killers. Any game, we’re killers. There are ten girls in the group, from the moment there is a ball and we count the points, there are fights all the time. We argue all the time. The worst loser unanimously designated by the girlfriends? Sarah Balzer, the youngest. We transcribe the exchange as it is:
- Berder: “She sulks, she sulks”
- Balzer: “I internalize a lot but I don’t want to show that I am raging in me”
- Berder, laughing to death: “Don’t worry, it shows”
This story of spikeball is so gripping on a daily basis that the physical trainers had to put a stop at the end of the preparatory camp just before the Games. The stupid wound soon arrived. “It must be said that Cécilia throws herself on the ground to pick up the balls”, jokes Manon Brunet. “In general, when we do a team sport on the side, we do it thoroughly,” adds Charlotte Lembach. Like on the track, what ”. Come on, spikeball for everyone before Paris 2024.