Katharine Holmes celebrates winning bronze at the Tallinn Women’s Épée World Cup on Nov. 11, 2018 in Tallinn, Estonia.
Coming off the first world title in program history, the U.S. women’s epee fencing team opened the world cup season on a high note, defeating South Korea to finish third in Tallinn, Estonia.
The top-seeded U.S. team of Katharine Holmes, Courtney Hurley, Kelley Hurley and Kasia Nixon beat South Korea 21-20 on Sunday. The Hurleys and Holmes were on the U.S. team that also defeated South Korea this past July when the U.S. women’s epee team won the world title.
Prior to that, the U.S. women’s epee team had never won a medal at the world championships. The U.S. team also won its first world cup team event last season in Dubai.
The momentum continued this weekend in Tallinn.
Team USA opened the team event with convincing wins over Spain and Estonia before falling 45-37 to fourth-seeded France in the semifinals. South Korea was seeded second.
In the third-place match, Holmes, a 2010 Youth Olympian and 2016 Olympian, scored four hits as Team USA came back from a 19-17 deficit to win. Kelley Hurley, a three-time Olympian, led the U.S. with 10 hits.
The victory comes one day after the individual competition in Tallinn, in which Nixon, a 2014 Youth Olympian, was the top U.S. finisher at 27th.
Chrös McDougall has covered the Olympic movement for TeamUSA.org since 2009 on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc. He is based in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
