College fencing programs aren’t built overnight — and varsity status can take years of persistence, patience, and a campus community that believes fencing belongs. In this episode of First to 15, Bryan Wendell sits down with Peter Grandbois, the force behind Denison University’s fencing growth from a small club reboot to a thriving program: a women’s varsity team since 2019 and a men’s team moving from club to varsity in 2026. Grandbois shares what it actually takes to start and sustain a collegiate fencing program from scratch — from recruiting students who’ve never fenced before to building culture, securing budget, and proving long-term stability to administrators. They also dig into Grandbois’s own fencing path — sparked by a single college flyer — his veteran-level return to competition (including Team USA’s trip to Dubai), and the overlap he sees between fencing and creative writing: risk, creativity, rejection, and resilience. Plus, a rapid-fire recruiting segment on subject lines, what coaches watch (hint: not just the score), and what surprises most fencers when they arrive on campus.
Peter Grandbois — Head coach of Denison women’s varsity fencing; coach of Denison men’s club team (transitioning to varsity in 2026). English professor and creative writing instructor. Veteran competitor and longtime coach.
How Denison fencing dates back to at least 1941 — and why college clubs often rise and fall with student energy
The real grind of launching a program: recruiting on campus, building participation, and finding the “tipping point”
Why Denison elevated the women’s team to varsity in 2019, and what helped make the case
The role of culture: “work hard” and “have fun,” creating a team people want to join
Budget and equipment realities — and how to educate decision-makers on what fencing actually needs
Coaching challenges: building three-weapon coaching capacity, learning sabre, and finding additional coaching support
The administrator pitch: enrollment, diversity, academic profile, and cost-benefit
Grandbois’s origin story: starting fencing in college because of a flyer — and why that matters
How competing as a veteran helps him coach better
Fencing and creative writing: risk-taking, discomfort, failure, and persistence
Recruiting lightning round:
Best email subject lines for recruits
Results vs. being a great teammate
What coaches watch when scouting
The ideal parent role
What surprises most fencers about college fencing (strength & conditioning)
“Patience and persistence are the two biggest hallmarks of trying to start a fencing program.”
“We can always grow a fencer, but it’s harder to make them great teammates.”
“Creativity happens in the unknown — in fencing and in writing.”
SEASON 2, EPISODE 22
[0:00:01] BW: College fencing programs aren't built overnight. Even under the best circumstances, they can take years or decades to acquire varsity status. And this can require persistence and patience, and especially people who believe that the sport belongs on campus. Today's guest is someone who's lived every version of that. He's been an elite international athlete. He's been a college and club coach, an educator, and a builder of programs. Peter Grandbois helped shape fencing at Denison University in Ohio from the ground up. And today he coaches a women's varsity team and soon a men's varsity team. And he's also a teacher at Denison and has published books.
In this episode of First to 15, we're going to talk about what it takes to start and sustain a college fencing program, how Denison's worked, and how fencing fits into a broader educational mission because they're students before they're athletes. Right, Peter? Welcome to First of 15.
[0:00:55] PG: Well, thank you. Thank you for having me.
[0:00:56] BW: Yeah, this conversation is long overdue, but the timing is perfect because, as we said in the intro, the big news out of Denison is that the men's program, which currently exists as a club program, is becoming a varsity program. I think it's first helpful to walk through the history of fencing at Denison. And if you can tell us where it started, and then the progression into varsity status first for the women's team and then now for the men's team.
[0:01:22] PG: We're super excited to have the men's team. I just want to say that I just talked to the men's club, actually, yesterday, and they were practically in tears. I mean, they're very, very excited about it. So, a lot of energy here around fencing and around the coming men's varsity team. Denison has had a club, a fencing club, like many colleges do. I think there's over 100 colleges and universities that have fencing clubs. We've had one since at least 1941. That's what I can figure out.
Back in the original, the first NCAA National Championships were held in 1941, thanks to one of our historians, George Mason. He told me this. And there were 19 teams that competed, and one of them was actually Denison. They took 19th place, and they may have been the only club team there. I think they were maybe invited because they were local. It was held at Ohio State. But that's the earliest record I can get of Denison fencing.
And there's been – like many college clubs, again, it's been on and off since then. Many clubs run when there's student energy, and they're at a high, and they're moving. And when there's no student energy, they kind of collapse. And that's the danger with some college clubs. And that was the case when I arrived. I arrived here as a professor of English at Denison in 2010. And within a year, about a year later or so, I started checking into the idea. I wanted to get back into the sport of fencing. It had been a great – I had been away from it for 17 years.
And I was looking for a little more joy in my life. I was working hard, raising three kids, establishing the career in the family, and just wanted to have a little something that I could do. So, I started fencing myself as a veteran, but also looked to start to create a club. And I looked into Denison. I found a closet of old equipment. Most of which wouldn't pass the legal standards today. And there were actually a couple of fencers that were still kind of there from the – the club had just kind of recently gone through one of those dying out periods.
I started working with them. Honestly, they were more interested in sort of hack and slay. I don't know. They did not really want to do the sort of sport fencing, competitive fencing that I was interested in starting at Denison. So they dropped out very quickly. I started to advertise around campus. Flyers were my major weapon of choice. I pasted the campus with flyers. And you mentioned patience and persistence in your introduction. That's probably the two biggest hallmarks of trying to start a fencing program. It did take a while. Took a lot of patience and persistence.
For a few years, I would plaster the campus with flyers. I would talk to anybody who would listen about joining the fencing club. And every semester, you might get 20 people joining. And then within a month, maybe two people stay. For those first few years, we had two or three people that would hang on and actually would start to travel to local USFA tournaments with me, and they really actually wanted to train to become better fencers in the Olympic-style sport of fencing.
That started to change around 2015. We got a bigger group of people. That's what you're waiting for. You're looking for that sort of tipping point where you get – because nobody – that's the hard part. Nobody wants to join a club where there's one other person in it.
[0:04:15] BW: Especially fencing, right? You need more opponents.
[0:04:18] PG: Especially fencing. It took a while to get – and for whatever reason, we had a group that stuck with it. They were sabre fencers. That's been, I think, maybe – I had a hand in starting a high school team back in the 90s, Adlai Stevenson High School. I helped with that. And same thing there, there was a lot of growth in sabre primarily. I think there's a certain energy that young people bring to sabre. So, we had this group. And suddenly, that started to coalesce and bring more people in. And then we had a men's team.
And so in 2015, I approached the Midwest Fencing Conference, which at that time is a college conference made up of varsity teams like Ohio State or Northwestern and Lawrence University, Cleveland State, etc. And then also club teams, a lot of college club teams. And I asked if we could join, and they said that we could only join on one condition, and that's if we had a women's team in the next year. At that point, I had a men's team, 10 men, and I had one woman. And so I had a mission for the next year. I had to have a women's team.
And so we joined the Midwest Fencing Conference, and we started to compete in these in-college meets, again, as many club teams do. And I started again, back to the process of lots of flyers all around campus and talking to lots of people. And we ended up with a women's team. And ever since then, 2016, I'm very happy to say, and something I'm very proud of, is that I've always had a full team. I've never gone to a tournament with less than a full team. That's something to say, particularly on the women's side, where it is sometimes difficult. I can talk about how that's different later if you want, but it's sometimes difficult to recruit and keep women in college fencing in clubs and even in many varsity teams.
I'm very happy that we had a women's team starting in 2016 or 2017. And once we hit that sort of tipping point, the team just exploded. And pretty soon, I had 18 men and 18 women. And the university saw that energy. They saw that we were competing regularly. They saw that we were winning and doing well. And they saw that there was – particularly, again, I think this is very important that there was interest from women because, of course, with Title IX and so on. And many colleges are very concerned in making sure that they're getting women participation in the sport, and they were really pleased with that.
And so they elevated the women to varsity status in 2019. And so they've been varsity now for seven years. The men have been a competitive club during this time. And we were waiting patiently at the time. They said if we do elevate the men to varsity status, it would be after we add another women's sport. And so, again, back to patience and persistence, I was thinking, "Okay, that'll just be in another year or two." And no, it wasn't that. I think COVID certainly slowed things down, as it tends to do with a lot of universities. But we eventually added a women's water polo team, and I think that set the ground, made it right for asking again. I went to my AD. And also, US fencing had a big hand in this and went to our AD and talked to them, and together we worked out adding the men's varsity team for 2026.
[0:07:12] BW: Yeah. So I want to go back to the women's team getting varsity status because obviously, had that not happened, then you wouldn't really have a case to elevate the men, or maybe you do both at the same time. But let's go back to that because it's so interesting to me that in Denison's case, the proof that fencing could work there was the club team. It wasn't looking at other colleges that are kind of like Denison that maybe are proof that fencing would work here as a varsity sport. You already had the proof. What was it exactly that convinced the administration that this was a sport worth investing in? What was that kind of tipping point back in 2019 that made them say, "Hey, you guys are legit?"
[0:07:52] PG: Well, I think that also – back to how you can turn a program. I mean, I think marketing and branding, all these terms that are so important. I was very conscious of that, and I'm not normally kind of that kind of person. As a professor, that's not my forte. But throughout that time, I was very much highlighting, look at the results here. Look at what our team is doing. Again, we were beating varsity teams, even division one varsity teams. We were beating big club teams, some of the best club teams in the country. Again, they see those results, and they saw the size. And at one point, they saw that we had maybe more women than men. There was at one point where we had that.
Again, for administrators. I think those are both really big points. They saw the results, they saw the energy, they talked. We're a small college, so our president, he's very active on campus, and he'll talk to students all the time. And he would talk to students, and they would talk about, "Fencing's changed my life." When you hear that enough, they're like, "Wow, there's something happening here, and we want to keep growing it and keep making it stronger."
[0:08:51] BW: Now to this day, are you still a professor in addition to the head coach of the team?
[0:08:56] PG: I am. I'm teaching less now. There was a time, I will say, where, when COVID hit, all universities were pinching their purses and really being careful. I was teaching full-time and coaching the men and women. And at that time, we were pretty – again, we had 36 fencers, 18 men, 18 women. And I have never been so tired in my life as I was in that time. But since then, they've been cutting some classes for me. I do still teach, but just one class a semester, which is still plenty considering now I'm coaching two teams, but manageable.
[0:09:26] BW: Yeah. Okay. That's interesting. Maybe you know this answer. I wonder how many NCAA head fencing coaches are also teaching classes as well academically.
[0:09:36] PG: Not many. I think in any sport, and I think the ones that are coaching PE-type classes. Yeah. I've yet to find anybody coaching or teaching in another discipline.
[0:09:46] BW: Yeah. I mean, high school, you hear the head football coach is the history teacher or something like that, but not so much in college. I love that, actually. Looking back on the journey for the men's team now, how did the athletes feel about this knowing that, "Hey, this could be just one or two years away," but that the clock is kind of ticking, right? Because that 4-year window that you have as a student athlete to see the program get elevated to varsity status is pretty narrow.
[0:10:14] PG: It's interesting. Because when this happened, I think I've literally gotten a text, or an email, or a phone call from every alum that we've had come through the program. They're so happy. That's the other part of it. The alum are so proud and so happy. And as I said, I mean, some to the point of tears. Again, having this meeting yesterday and talking to our seniors in the men's club and seeing how, one hand, they're super excited, on the other hand, they're like, "Why couldn't it have happened before I graduated?"
And they see it. I mean, I reminded them, and they saw it, and they real – you created this. Again, back to what creates something like this, it was their hard work. They put in the time. They showed that they were capable of being varsity athletes. They worked as hard as varsity athletes. They got great results. They always had a great attitude, and they built a very positive culture. That's one thing that I can also talk about later. The importance of having that positive culture to grow a team, to make a team where people want to join. And they did that. And so I remind them of that. And I think they take a real pride in the fact that they had a hand. Every one of those alums and the graduating seniors have had a hand in creating both the women's varsity team and now the men's varsity team.
[0:11:19] BW: Yeah. Let's talk about the student factor here. How much was the interest from students and the student leaders that you had elevated to be captains of the team? How much did that factor into this? You talked a little bit about the administration talking to students and them being advocates for the program, but what else happened behind the scenes that maybe people from the outside wouldn't appreciate?
[0:11:42] PG: I think it's just that it happened pretty quickly. Within a couple years of our club success with the women and men, for the women to be elevated to varsity status, it happened pretty quickly. And they were super excited, but I don't think they had time to be hungry in the sense for it and realize – it just happened to them.
On the men's side, once it happened with the women, there were seven years of the men saying, "We want this to happen." And working so hard to do that and to show, "Hey, we're showing this." They were asking me every month, every semester, "When's this going to happen? What can we do to make it happen?"
And they were talking to – and I would say, "Well, keep doing what you're doing. But also, make yourself known." They would reach out to the administration, too, and say, "Hey, look what we're doing. Great things are happening in fencing." I think that they played a hand in that way as well, just reaching out to administration and just telling them, making their case, so to speak.
[0:12:31] BW: And making their case on the strip, too, right? It helps when the results are there and when they can show that they're successful and competitive on the strip, too.
[0:12:39] PG: Yeah, results are certainly important for athletic directors, but I think it's the consistency of having a full team and having large numbers of student interest. I think that's really key. If you're having a struggling program where one year it's okay, and the next year it's like this, and they see that, that's not a sign that this is a healthy program that can continue on. But if you see this consistent growth and consistent energy and consistently high numbers, those numbers for a small school like Denison are pretty strong.
I've seen other college clubs, and even there was a varsity team, not to mention name, a few years back that was varsity for a year or two. They were a new varsity team program. They were around for a year or two. They could not get a women's team together. And I think that was a large reason why they ended up not continuing.
[0:13:23] BW: Yeah. The consistency. If you had to hit the reset button, let's say on Denison and you were starting everything from scratch with the same level of fencing interest and expertise that you have, you're a competitive fencer yourself in your youth, still are now as a vet, what are some of the obstacles that schools are going to face when trying to start a program from scratch? I imagine this is a conversation that you and Brad Suchorski, on the USA fencing side, and others have had. What are some of the roadblocks that are going to be in their way that they need to overcome?
[0:13:57] PG: One of the ones is that what I mentioned before is just that recruitment. Just getting that initial student interest and getting that initial group to stick. And once you have that, you're golden. I don't know if I have a recipe for how to do that besides patience and persistence. And I think trying to create a positive culture, a growth culture, a culture of working hard, but also a culture of having fun. I think sometimes coaches miss out on one or the other. It's all about fun, and that's okay, but that's not maybe going to move you to varsity status. And sport is all about hard work, and they forget that people have to want to come, especially in club. They have to want to come there. That recruitment piece is really important.
[0:14:35] BW: You're talking about recruiting students who are already at the school, right? Because now you're worried about recruiting people to Denison as well, which is a good problem to have, that you can say, "Hey, come join this great fencing program." But back when you started, you weren't trying to get people to come to Denison. You were trying to get Denison's students to sign up for fencing.
[0:14:52] PG: I will say finding the balance is really key between that work hard and have fun.
[0:14:57] BW: Yeah.
[0:14:57] PG: When you're recruiting students who have never fenced before, and in some cases with fencers, fencing is a unique sport. In some cases, you're getting students that have never been athletes before in any sport, and I'm very proud of that. I mean, I remember specific fencers that went on to great success competing against varsity athletes with no experience before who had never been athletes in any sport before. And that's, I think, something really unique about fencing, and I'm really proud of that.
Yeah, it's really finding that balance of making it an attractive place. I made it like a home. We had dinners at my house. We have team dinners at my house, parties at my house, and so on. Again, trying to find that balance of making it fun. But also, as I said, I want it to be – I'm a competitor. I always talk about how I want to keep moving up and to the top level. I want to beat everybody. And so trying to say this. But it's also going to be about working hard. And so, finding that balance took a little while, I think. I think I found it. But I think it's one of those things you're always adjusting.
The other roadblock, I think, that's big for any school is budget, is money. And that's a tough one. And it's probably a little different for every school. Back to persistence and patience. At Denison, it was about dealing with the student government, and that's who hands out the funds for the club sports. That was really difficult at first, I will say. I would put in a list of things we needed because, again, I had to throw out most of the equipment, and say masks were at the top of the list, and safety.
And then I would get back the budget thing, and they would deny me masks. And they would say, “Sorry. We're not going to give you any of those. We'll give you socks." And I'm like, "This doesn't make any sense." Basically, educating people on what we needed. Being persistent. Going back to administration and saying, "No, we have students here that want to do this."
And I am lucky. I think not every college may have this, but Denison has been very supportive. When they see student interest, they support it. That's been good, even though there were struggles at times. I think at other colleges, it may be more difficult. But that persistence and going back to administration, going back to the student government, and saying, "No, we need these things," helped. Occasionally, maybe I had to supplement with some of my own equipment just to get us by in those early years. But that was a big thing. And then once we got established and they saw what we were doing, it became much easier then to get the money.
[0:17:05] BW: And then what about coaching? You're a foil fencer yourself. And so, suddenly, are you coaching sabre and epee fencers as well? Were you able to hire somebody even back in the club days to join your coaching staff? Tell me about that journey. Because when you talk about people who have no fencing experience joining your club team, it occurs to me that you need someone who's willing and able to spend that time with them.
[0:17:27] PG: That's right. And I have a friend who's a physics professor at another university in Ohio who does not have the background that I have in fencing, and he's running their club at that university, and he does a great job. But he calls me all the time, asks questions about things.
[0:17:40] BW: Sure. Yeah.
[0:17:41] PG: And he tries to get the students to coach, which is often what happens at places where there's not a coach. Students will take up the mantle if they're experienced. Harder at a smaller school like Denison. We get very few experienced fencers in. But at a bigger school, that's often the case.
For me, yeah, I was a foil fencer, but I was lucky to sort of pay for my foil fencing. I started coaching, and I took early coaching clinics in epee way back when I was a competitor. And so I trained in coaching epee, actually. I felt very comfortable. I've been coaching epee for as long almost as I've been fencing foil. So, that was great.
Sabre was a little different. Also, again, as I mentioned, back in the early 90s, I had a hand in starting a high school fencing team, a varsity high school fencing team there. And again, as it often happens, I noticed many men initially really want to do sabre, especially young men. They their first go-to. Then they sort out into the other weapons. I had a lot of saberists. I had to learn how to give saber lessons.
Those were in the days before YouTube. So, it was a lot of just talking to other coaches and watching other coaches and then trying things out. Since then, we have YouTube, and I've been able to go online and study a lot of coaching lessons. Of course, whenever I'm at a tournament, I spend a good part of my time watching other coaches give lessons, learning from other coaches. And I've also now since done sabre clinics to help kind of shore up my coaching deficiencies in saber. And so, yeah, I've coached all three weapons for most of the time here. We now have a sabre coach who takes over most of the sabre lessons. But probably, as we go forward, there'll still be some splitting of lessons. But primarily, I do foil and epee.
[0:19:11] BW: Okay. Let's have a scenario here. Let's say you're at some type of NCAA gathering event, and an administrator at another school that doesn't have fencing, maybe they're in many ways like Denison academically, location-wise, everything. Similar school. And they say, "Hey, why fencing? Why would my school be a good fit for fencing? How does that fit into my athletic ecosystem at X College?" What's your kind of pitch to them having seen what you've seen at Denison?
[0:19:45] PG: Yeah, I've talked to some administrators. I've had this conversation. And I say fencing is a – if you're looking to grow student enrollment and to get students that you really want to have at your university, fencing is a great sport to add for a few reasons. One, the last time I looked at the statistics, the NCAA statistics, it was the most diverse sport in division 3 athletics, and the second most diverse sport overall in athletics.
We have a very large Asian-American population, along with other minority groups. And so that's, I think, a very much of interest to universities. Asian-Americans are the least represented group in college athletics. That's something. Fencers – again, it's been a few years since I looked at statistics. I used to have all those and all my pie charts and so on, so that I could present them to administration. Back to that, as far as make your PowerPoints and get all that information when you talk to administration. I'd give them all these talking points.
They're also really good students, right? Again, college varsity athletes tend to have higher GPA than non-athletes. But of all the sports, often, fencing tops the list in terms of the highest GPA in college. And so, again, these are great students that you want to bring in as well. They're going to do well in college. And every college wants those.
And then finally, again, at a time when post-COVID – COVID did a real number on a lot of colleges and universities. But also, a lot of things going on in the world right now that are making colleges and universities very nervous and tightening their purse strings. They're looking for ways to grow and to be financially stable. Adding sports is a great way to do that, and fencing in particular. Because, again, you're getting students that in general. Again, we have a wide range of student athletes in our sport. But in general, they're going to be people that are able to pay that tuition at a private university and so on.
And so, for a lot of private universities – and I think the real growth is going to be in private universities and particularly smaller division three colleges and universities. Those three things are really wonderful things to add to the college. And where fencing's been added, I've talked to administrators, and they said it's one of the best things we could do.
[0:21:47] BW: I love that. The enrollment, retention, campus diversity, you hit on all those. And then for the cost of adding fencing when it comes to equipment and facilities needs, where does fencing compare to some of these other sports that maybe have a similar roster size?
[0:22:05] PG: I think that's great. I mean, I don't have a real specific answer in all those. I've glanced at graphs, so it's a little bit from my memory. But in general, fencing is on the lower price end. I'm not going to say it's not the lowest, but it's not the highest either. You can get by with a fencing program relatively modestly. And again, I think that sort of cost-benefit ratio, you're bringing in students that are generally paying more than at other sports, and you're spending generally less than most sports. It's a win-win.
[0:22:31] BW: Let's move into talking a little bit about you, Peter. How did you first get into fencing? And what was your college fencing experience like?
[0:22:40] PG: I started fencing in college. I started as a freshman at the University of Colorado, long time ago. And it was at a time when – well, actually, at that time, there were over a hundred college varsity fencing programs. So far more than there are now. That was before Title IX and before so many programs got cut. But I was lucky.
I mean, I loved sword fighting. I did it with my friends all the time, any way I could. If there was a movie on TV that had sword fighting in it, I found a way to look through my TV guide. I don't know if people know what that is, but find that and watch that movie. But again, fencing was smaller then. It was not as big as it is now. There was no fencing that I knew of in my area. I grew up in a suburb of Denver. Turned out there were people like Gary Copeland who was doing a program in Boulder. He had a club back in Boulder at that time, but I didn't know about that. That's still an hour from Denver.
My first exposure was when I went to University of Colorado. And probably the reason I put flyers up so often and how that worked for me is because that's what I saw at University of Colorado. I saw a flyer on some post, "Come join the beginning fencing class in our fencing club." And I went there as a freshman, fall of my fresh freshman year, and immediately fell in love with the sport. I was lucky that we had an actual French fencing master, Henri Darricau, who he was supposed to fence in the '80 Olympics, and then things happened. And he ended up taking a vacation in the US and then ended up staying. And he had started that club at University of Colorado. And we became best friends. And I immediately fell in love with fencing and became obsessed with it very quickly. It very quickly took over my life.
And we had a great group. I remember that group. So it was a club fencing, but we were an active, competitive club. We had undergraduates and graduates. And I remember, again, that international experience of fencing, that's one of the things that attracted me. I remember we had a student from Norway, a student from Hong Kong, and so on, and then from all over the US.
And a real great core group of people that again had created a positive culture where we, again, worked hard and had fun. Again, we traveled to tournaments together. I remember driving with my friends to the neighboring states, Kansas, New Mexico, Utah, to go to any tournaments we could. And it was really the most fun I've had. And I tell my fencers the same thing, or my recruits, I tell my recruits, "College fencing is going to be the most fun you ever have. Yeah, you're going to work hard. You're going to get a lot better, but you're going to also have a lot of fun traveling around with your team. That's the great thing about it."
And so, I just loved it. And, of course, continued on. Then I branched out. As I mentioned, Gary Copeland, he had a club in Boulder. So I started taking extra lessons from him and so on. And then eventually became one of the stronger, if not the strongest fencer in that area, and was looking, "Where do I go from here?" Looked at New York, LA, San Francisco. Those are the places that were strong at the time. And ended up settling in San Francisco, where I was really lucky to train with many members of the US team and get great coaching and all that, and continued on.
I started late. Of course, the pressure of career and family started to build and ended up leaving fencing for a while. Of course, it was our first few years, I left. I'd find my way back in whenever I could just to do a little bit of fencing. But then the time commitments of three kids eventually, and so on, and career made it pretty difficult. And I was away from fencing for almost 17 years. And then, as I said, came back both as a fencer in the veterans’ category and then said I want to start program, too, and as a coach.
[0:26:06] BW: And it all started with a flyer on the University of Colorado campus.
[0:26:10] PG: All started with a flyer.
[0:26:11] BW: Which is crazy. I mean, if you think back in history, had you not seen that flyer that day, maybe Denison wouldn't have a fencing team. And look at how far it's come. To me, it's just wild to think about that kind of thing.
[0:26:23] PG: It's crazy. And I've seen the same thing with my fencers, which, again, makes me so proud. I'm going to a wedding for two of my fencers who met on our team, in our club team. And again, they saw the flyers. They would all laugh that nobody else could put up a flyer at Denison because every space was covered with my fencing flyers.
[0:26:40] BW: Hey, that's marketing right there. I love that. Your vet career, which included a trip to Dubai in 2024.
[0:26:49] PG: Recently. Yeah.
[0:26:49] BW: To represent Team USA at the vet level. So, congratulations on that. What drives you to want to continue fencing yourself? Because you obviously get plenty of fencing just from giving lessons and coaching, but you like to get out there and compete as well. What's the motivation there, Peter?
[0:27:05] PG: I love fencing. And that's one of the questions I ask all of my recruits, "Why do you fence?" Know your why is really important. And actually, I'm about to have a meeting with my team. We're going to talk about knowing your why. Again, I just really love fencing. I'm passionate about it. And so, coaching fulfills some of that. But being on the strip, feeling the way time slows down, the way I can do these movements, it feels like a dance to me. And I love it. I'm addicted to it at some level, I guess. I remain obsessed as I start – as I said, it started way back in college, and was obsessed. And I'm still obsessed.
Finding ways to do that. I think coaching fulfills a lot of it. But I also find – really, again, it's important for me to know what my fencers experience by going through it myself. I go to these vet tournaments, I get nervous. I have to deal with the nerves. They affect me. Or I do an action, and I do it wrong, and whatever. All these different things that go on. Or learning different tactical situations. It makes me, I think, a better coach to be out there doing it, too. I can remind myself, "Oh, wow. This is what it feels like." And yeah, it's hard sometimes.
[0:28:02] BW: Your students, were they cheering you on when you were in Dubai, just like you cheer them on when they go to a tournament?
[0:28:08] PG: I was really lucky that the last tournament to qualify for Dubai was at the Summer Nationals in Columbus. Quite a few students were there, and they were cheering me on as I won that. Yeah, many watched. And then were super excited to see the streaming of the Dubai tournament as well.
[0:28:24] BW: That's so cool. Okay, so you teach creative writing. Is there any intersection between creative writing and the creativity that a fencer has? Do you draw those conclusions either in your mind when you're teaching or coaching, or even to your students?
[0:28:40] PG: I do actually. Yeah. In both cases. In my mind all the time, and with the students, and with my fencers. I really see both as very creative. I think that's one of the things that – I mean, I think all sports can be creative, and I think all writing can be creative. But fencing in particular is a very creative sport. You're figuring things out with that other person. A few things that I tell my writers that I tell my fencers that are the same. You have to be willing to take risks. You can't win championships without taking risks. And that's scary for a lot of people, and it's scary for writers, too, to take risks on the page. Easier to play it safe, right?
I talk about creativity happening sort of in the unknown. That we learn where we get uncomfortable. That when we're comfortable, creativity doesn't happen. And in fencing, we don't learn when we're still comfortable. We have to push into discomfort to learn, which is hard, I think, for everyone, especially young people. And we have to push into discomfort and the unknown to be creative. And so we talk about that as well, and how hard that is.
Because I'll talk about a specific move, and a fencer will say, "Oh, I'll get hit if I do that." Or, "Oh, a referee won't give that to me because they don't know the rules." And I'll say, "Yeah, those things can happen, but you've got to be willing to embrace that and to do that and acknowledge that there are risks in anything to do that action. And to do a creative action, you have to realize that a referee may not see it the first time." Creativity and risk-taking are very similar in both disciplines.
[0:29:57] BW: And knowing what it's like to face rejection or failure as well. Every writer who wants to be published will get a dozen rejection letters or more before they find that one. And you're going to lose your first few tournaments in fencing, too, right? In most scenarios, you're not going to be the winner, right?
[0:30:15] PG: That's a super important point. Yes, as a successful writer, I can say that every day I get lots of rejections. And before the first book, maybe there are 70 rejections. And I will say that as a fencer, it's obviously the same thing, right? And I tell the students that same thing, right? When they say, "Well, this won't work." Well, yeah, it probably won't work the first time, or the 10th time, or the hundredth time, or the thousandth time. You've got to do it a thousand times before it starts to work. And that's the same with rejection, you got to get all those rejections before things start turning around.
[0:30:45] BW: You talked about going to the wedding of a couple of your alumni, which I love that. What are some of the other ways that you feel like fencing at Denison specifically is an experience that stays with fencers long after they graduate, like it's paying off even if they've put down their weapon for the time being.
[0:31:05] PG: Right. And many of them do. I mean, I'm always super excited when they fence. I remember recently going to a tournament and seeing one of our alumni come back to fencing, and I was super excited. And many of them do fence, but many of them put it down. There are the realities, again, of career, and life, and family, and so on.
I think, again, back to that hallmark of creating that positive culture where a place where people really want to be, where they feel really good about learning, and where they feel part of a family. Once you've established that sort of culture or family atmosphere, they never forget that those bonds are there for life. And so they know, I think, when they reach out to me that I love to hear from them, and I reach out to them to find out how they're doing. And some of them have gone on to all sorts of really interesting things. Some of them come back to fencing. I guess the proof is in the pudding in the sense that I know it was a successful program because the alumni come back for our alumni.
Oh, we also have an alumni meet every year where we invite them back, and they come back for that, and they have a great time. And also, they just reach out all the time. And I'm in touch with all of them. And so I think that shows me that this has also been a big part of their life. And many of them say that, of course, that it did change their life as well. That flyer did something for them and moved them in a new direction.
[0:32:14] BW: That's great. Well, okay. To close, now we're going to do five quick questions, and they're all going to be about recruiting. And I was lucky enough to moderate a panel that you were on at Junior Olympics, where you shared some of these same pieces of wisdom. First of all, thanks for that. And then we'll start with the caveat that what Peter's sharing today might apply to Denison, but each school has a slightly different fencing landscape. We can just have that umbrella over this entire conversation. But we'll do five quick questions about this. Number one is what makes a good subject line for an email to Peter from a potential recruit?
[0:32:50] PG: Well, I mean, yeah, get right to the point. So, weapon, graduation year, gender. Sometimes that's not apparent. Those are really, really crucial things. And then getting, I guess, the subject line, but also getting right to why you're interested in Denison. Ideally, that they've shown that little research, something specific that they know about our pro fencing program or about our university.
[0:33:10] BW: And then question two, would you rather have someone whose results are higher, but they're not the best teammate? You've seen them kind of react in a negative way to their coach, or someone whose results are maybe not quite as strong, but you've watched them fence in teams, and they're really incredible teammates.
[0:33:29] PG: Yeah. I mean, without question, the latter. They're really looking for good teammates and good team players. We're looking for positive people who love fencing, who know their why. And that's really a hard thing. Because, again, young people– I mean, everybody. It's hard for everybody. Self-reflection is hard for everyone. And if you're young, maybe more so. Know your why. Many fencers at that age aren't really sure. They're doing it because their parents have told them to. They're doing it because the coach tells them, whatever the case. I'm looking for that passion. Know your why. Be a good teammate. And we'll take that any time over results.
I've definitely let fencers go that had great results. I like to know some fencers that have been my best recruits in terms of results, and they get here, and you realize, "No, they're not a good cultural fit." So yeah, the most important. We can always grow a fencer, but it's harder to make them great teammates.
[0:34:13] BW: Sure. Okay. Question three is somewhat related to that. If you're walking around Junior Olympics and you're like, "Okay, I'm going to watch this fencer who is considering coming to Denison. They're on strip G2." I'm walking up. What are you actually watching for? Because my guess is it's not just the final score of that bout.
[0:34:29] PG: Right. Again, I don't care about the final score. Often, so many times, fences are so embarrassed that they lost while I'm watching them. And I try not to even let them know I'm watching. I try to stand in the distance. But I can tell, they get upset if they lost when a coach is watching. I've talked to a lot of coaches, "Don't worry. We don't care about if it's a win or a loss." What we care about is one, yeah, basic technique. We're looking for how you move on the strip, what your basic technique is. That's important. We all have faults, but we want to look for other things we can work with.
Two, we want to look at how you handle yourself tactically on the strip. What happens if you're down four-zero? What happens if you're up four-zero? How do you handle those situations? Because those are really important? And they tell us a lot about who you are as a character. And then three, how do you handle that loss? Again, a loss is just fine. It's how you handle it. Do you throw your mask? I hope not. Right? Are you yelling at your parents and coach afterwards? I hope not. Those are things that coaches see, and they're warning signs for us, right? We want to see that you handle it well.
Obviously, you may not be happy. We get it. I'm not happy when I lose, but we want to handle it respectfully. And think about it, and reflect on it. What could we do better? Same with wins, right? How do you handle a win? Could be the same thing. We're looking at that character piece as well.
[0:35:38] BW: Yeah. And then question four, what should ideally the role of a parent be in the recruiting process?
[0:35:44] PG: Great question. Great question. As an active supporter, I think it's really the key thing. What we're looking for as college coaches is to talk to the athlete and to see how the athlete responds and handles themselves because they're going to have to do that in college. College is the time when they have to be responsible for themselves. We don't talk to the parents in college as professors or as coaches. And even billing, even the bill goes to the student. It doesn't go to parents, right? So students have to manage everything. And so we are looking for students that are showing that they're beginning to do that.
Obviously, they're still young. But we're not going to be, "Oh, you didn't do that." But we want to see that they're starting to handle that. The biggest mistake I think parents can make, and really what is kind of a warning sign for some coaches, is the parent handles all the emails and doesn't let the student respond. Or you're in the video call, and the parent – I mean, I don't mind if a parent's there. I prefer personally. Every coach might be different. But I prefer to talk just to the student first, and then the next video call with the parent. But sometimes it's the first time, and that's okay. But if the parent asks all the questions and the student doesn't even really look up, that might be a warning sign too. But we're really looking for that the student is advocating for themselves and starting to handle the responsibilities that will come along with being a college student and being on a varsity team.
[0:36:52] BW: Yeah, that's great. Okay, last question. What's something that is likely to surprise a high school fencer about college fencing? When they get there, and they start on your team, something that maybe they weren't expecting.
[0:37:05] PG: I would say the biggest thing is the strength and conditioning portion. Every college program that I know of has the team goes together to a – it might be the coaches, but it might be separate strength and conditioning coaches. At Denison, there's a separate strength and conditioning team. And the team goes to do that, anywhere from two times a week to three times a week to more. And that's something that's new for most club fencers that have not been in college. A very new experience for them.
Actually, from my experience, they're all really nervous about it at first. And then they realize it's actually one of the things that makes it a lot of fun because you go as a team together. Our team takes turns putting on music. You have music blasting, and then they're cheering each other on. And so it's actually a great time. But it's new for them.
[0:37:44] BW: Yeah, I love that. That's interesting. I hadn't thought about that. Well, Peter, thank you so much for your time. And congrats on your success at Denison and also your success as a fencer yourself. And the perspective has been really great and kind of underscored for me why fencing has such a key role in higher education, not just as a sport, but as a broader learning experience that lasts well beyond those four years of college. Thank you, Peter. We'll be cheering you all on this season. And thanks to everybody for listening.
[0:38:13] PG: Thank you, Bryan. I really appreciate it.
[0:38:16] BW: Thanks for listening to First of 15, the official podcast of USA Fencing. We'll be back with our next conversation in a couple of weeks. In the meantime, you can stay up-to-date on all the latest fencing news by following us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. And if you like this podcast, please help us grow and reach more people by leaving us a rating or review. Until next time, I'm Bryan Wendell. And I hope to see you real soon out on the strip. Bye.
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