Throughout the history of fencing, there have been periods when Romanian fencers were world leaders in certain disciplines. In the 1960s, it was foil, with Olga Szab\u00f3-Orb\u00e1n as world champion and Ionel Dr\u00e2mb\u0103 as world and Olympic champion. This was followed by the 1970s, when the foil tradition was continued by Ecaterina Stahl, a world champion, but the sabre fencers also made their mark, consistently featuring on the world and Olympic podiums. The 1990s brought another great generation of foil fencers, with Laura Badea, Olympic champion at Atlanta in 1996, shining particularly bright. \u00a0In 2000, in Sydney, it was the turn of a sabre fencer to win Olympic gold: Mihai Covaliu, the current president of the Romanian Olympic and Sports Committee.<\/p>\n
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The new millennium saw the rise of the \u00e9p\u00e9e. Ana-Maria Br\u00e2nz\u0103 was Olympic silver medallist in Beijing in 2008, and again in Tokyo in 2021, but in 2016, in Rio, she won Olympic gold as part of Romania\u2019s women\u2019s \u00e9p\u00e9e team. Next came foil fencer Maria Boldor and sabre fencer Iulian Teodosiu, who won bronze in 2022 at the World Championships in Cairo. The baton was passed on, mainly in men\u2019s sabre. In 2025, at the World Championships in Tbilisi, the Romanian team, comprising Radu Ni\u021bu, Vlad Covaliu, George Dragomir and Iulian Teodosiu, won the bronze medal. This was followed this year by the European Championships in France, held in June, where the men\u2019s sabre team \u2013 with R\u0103zvan Ursachi replacing Teodosiu \u2013 won the silver medal, while George Dragomir took third place on the podium in the individual sabre event.<\/p>\n
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Romanian fencers have once again captured the attention of sports fans at the 2026 World Championships, which are currently taking place in Hong Kong. And once again, the highest expectations were pinned on the sabre fencers, and they have lived up to them. Radu Ni\u021bu won a bronze medal in the individual event, achieving the greatest success of his career. He and his teammates have a strong chance of also reaching the podium in the team event on Thursday. Romania\u2019s squad, however, includes a European medallist and a World Championship medallist, so expectations are high. (MI)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Throughout the history of fencing, there have been periods when Romanian fencers were world leaders in certain disciplines. In the 1960s, it was foil, with Olga Szab\u00f3-Orb\u00e1n as world champion and Ionel Dr\u00e2mb\u0103 as world and Olympic champion. This was followed by the 1970s, when the foil tradition was continued by Ecaterina Stahl, a world […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":1043515,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40940],"tags":[],"coauthors":[113302],"class_list":["post-1043542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n