Aidan White, son of Ellen and Andy White, recently took home a silver medal at a Division III competition at Seacoast Fencing Club in Rochester, New Hampshire.

White, a junior at the Providence Country Day School, is an epee fencer with the Rhode Island Fencing Academy & Club (RIFAC). A thrusting weapon like the more commonly known foil, the epee is heavier, and in epee fencing, the entire body is a valid target.

White began fencing when he was 10 years old, after attending a RIFAC summer camp. As he tells it, the staff at the fencing academy was so nice, he decided he wanted to take more fencing lessons. “I just fell in love with the sport and kept it up,” he said.

White admits to a case of the nerves at the tournament, but said that he got off to a good start. He won all but one bout early on, emerging 3rd overall. The direct elimination (DE) round proved quite fortuitous for White, and he won three successive DE bouts. “I was feeling pretty confident, thinking maybe I could take it all,” he said. but I let my nerves get to me. He lost the fourth DE bout, but still secured the silver medal. “I put up a pretty good fight.”

White would love to fence in college, and is looking mostly at Division 3 universities, but said that if he continues to perform well he would be interested in taking a shot at Division 1.