TEEN VIEW: A tale of knights, Musketeers and swordsmen

The sensation of your own heart pounding rapidly against your chest as your blood underneath becomes incredibly warm, the stiffening of your muscles in both your legs and arms as you advance forward and the increased amount of concentration and stress as the point of your blade soars towards the torso of the opponent occurs every time I step onto a fencing strip. I compete in events not only for a victory but for the enjoyment of the athletic competition and more.

As a young child, I enjoyed reading literary works about medieval times, specifically knights. Along with reading about knights, I viewed movies about the same topic and era such as Monte Python, The Search for the Holy Grail, The Sword in the Stone and Alexander Duma’s novel turned into a movie, The Three Musketeers, but one film stood out from the rest: Rob Reiner’s The Princesses Bride. My obsession with swordsmen from the medieval times always existed but it did not materialize until I saw The Princesses Bride.

As a youth, my fantasy was to enter the knighthood as a squire and eventually become a full-fledged knight serving under a lord or a king. Unfortunately, I soon discovered people no longer fought in full suits of armor settling disputes with the blade of a sword. My father and mother viewed my disappointment and directed me to the next closest alternative: fencing.

At first, the coach at the local fencing club informed me that I was too young to participate in the sport because at the time I was 5. This, however, did not discouraged me from pursuing my career as a modern musketeer. I waited a year and then joined the fencing club in my town. Who knew that 12 years later I would still be fencing?

Now at the age of 17, I train in an Olympic-level fencing club in San Francisco that fosters Olympic hopefuls. Our club, the Massialas Fencing Club, currently has three Olympians that competed in the 2012 London Olympics.

While I continue to train three or four times per week in hope of becoming an Olympian myself. I still fence for the same reason I began fencing, I love it.

I fence because I still imagine myself as knight, a musketeer and a swordsman. I fence because I enjoy the moment the adrenaline kicks in, my light goes on, indicating a touch scored and I vanquish my opponent.

I fence because I relish the sport and the experience of competing in an art that dates back to the age of knights and musketeers. I fence because I am a modern knight.

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(Brian Howard is a 17-year-old senior at Casa Grande High School.)