Fencing: As teammates, former foes become friends

If you asked, most people would tell you fencing is an individual sport. But for Ed Kelley and Jonathan Yergler, junior epeeists on the fencing team and roommates for the last two years, it’s a little more complicated than that.

“We’re treated as a unit, rather than individuals,” Kelley joked.

Though that may be an exaggeration, it’s not hard to see why it would be true. After all, even on the closest-knit college sports team, how often does one find athletes who have been competing with each other for a decade?

For Kelley and Yergler, that is the case. The two first met more than 10 years ago in a tournament that featured some of the country’s best fencers under 10 years of age. Even then, Yergler had established himself as one of the best in the field.

“[Yergler] and a few other guys were just like the kings of the under-10 age group. They had that on lockdown,” Kelley said. At the time, Kelley was relatively new to the sport and measured a not-very-imposing 4 feet 4 inches.

“He actually just came out of nowhere and beat everyone up in [that tournament],” Yergler said.

From that point on, the two saw plenty of each other. Though Kelley lived in Texas and Yergler hailed from Florida, they fenced in numerous national and international tournaments in middle and high school, and also made many of the same elite teams. Needless to say, facing each other frequently did not make them the best of friends. Mostly, each knew the other was a threat to win any tournament he entered.

“I just generally didn’t like him until he came to school, actually,” Yergler said as Kelley, sitting next to him, indicated that the feeling was mutual. “But then we were recruited at the same time, we spent a lot of time together in training freshman year, that kind of thing, sort of helped building each other up fencing-wise.”

In fact, both fencers listed the presence of the other in his recruiting class as a large factor in his decision to come to Princeton. The program had an excellent reputation, and Yergler and Kelley were eager to be a part of a team that included such world-class fencers as, well, Yergler and Kelley.

“We were all kind of sold on the idea that you get better by training with better people,” Yergler said.

The amount of time the two spent together thanks to their talent made the transition from competitor to teammate easy. Aside from regular training, the two still found themselves competing in the same tournaments. And now they were traveling together, sometimes even leaving the country. When they got back, they both returned to their dorms in Whitman College.

Not surprisingly, the rest of the fencing team has taken notice of the duo, whom some have dubbed “The Twins.”

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“They’re really competitive with each other, they’re really good teammates and they push each other in practice,” senior foilist and captain Alex Mills said.

Pushing each other seems to be something Kelley and Yergler never tire of doing. Continuing the rivalry that began before they reached double digits, the two face each other often in practice. Each helps to perfect the other’s style by pointing out flaws both by discussing them and exposing them on the strip. Both acknowledge that they have improved greatly thanks to working with each other.

“The benefit is that we can have some pretty useful dialogue, discussion of strategy, picking up on what the other needs to work on,” Yergler said.

“The problem is that we learn each other’s tricks,” Kelley said.

Indeed, the two know each other’s style so well and have done so much to shape them that they now find themselves incredibly evenly matched.

“They may not be equal in stature, but they’re equal in heart,” said Mills with a laugh, commenting on the six-inch height differential between Yergler, 5 feet 11 inches, and Kelley, who is now 6 feet 5 inches.

Evidently, the size difference gives neither much of an advantage. When they were both up for a spot on the 2011 USA Fencing Junior World Team last year, Kelley beat out Yergler by 10 points, a tiny margin considering the thousands of points a high-level fencer racks up in a season. Kelley didn’t feel too bad about it, having narrowly lost the spot to Yergler the previous year.

They also find themselves at odds when competing for a bid to the NCAA Tournament. Only two epeeists from each team make the cut, and Princeton’s roster is deep enough to make for some stiff competition, especially between the two juniors.

After all that fencing against each other, Yergler and Kelley still find a way to live together. They were roommates in Whitman College as sophomores and live together again this year in a quad in Pyne Hall. Though they enjoy giving each other a hard time, their rooming situation is a testament to the bond that has developed between the two epeeists over a decade.

“There are times when we definitely get on each other’s nerves,” Yergler said of his friend, competitor, teammate and roommate. “But it’s a net positive, I’d say.”

This was, clearly, an understatement — the chemistry between Yergler and Kelley, both as athletes and as friends, isn’t something you find every day.