What Is a Cadet and Junior?
A fencer’s eligibility for a certain classification is determined by their birth year, as outlined in section 2.5.1 of the Athlete Handbook.
Note: Be sure to review the “Exception to Age Eligibility Criteria” in section 2.5.1 to see under which circumstances a fencer born after the cutoff year can fence at the Junior Olympics.
What Are the Junior Olympics?
Here’s what section 2.2.4 of the Athlete Handbook says about the Junior Olympics:
Junior Olympic Fencing Championship (JOs): The Junior Olympic Fencing Championships are held each year in February. JOs is the National Championships for Cadet, Junior and Junior Team in each of the six weapons. Fencers must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident, meet age criteria and qualify to compete in this tournament. Athletes that have represented another country in the last three years at FIE-level competitions (Veteran/Senior/ Junior and those athletes that represented another country in the Cadet World Championships) are not eligible to compete in a National Championship, unless the athlete has been officially approved by the FIE to represent the USA.
How Does Someone Qualify for the Junior Olympics?
There are three qualification paths. A fencer must complete at least one of the three to earn a spot at the Junior Olympics.
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Path 1: Earn any amount of national points between the previous Junior Olympics registration deadline and the current Junior Olympics registration deadline.
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Path 2: Earn at least a combined 110 regional points at your two best regional events between the previous Junior Olympics registration deadline and the current Junior Olympics registration deadline.
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Take the sum of the points earned at your two best regional events in the span above, and if that number is 110 or higher, you qualify
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Path 3: Finish in the Top 25% at the Division Qualifiers in your division
Note: If you qualify for juniors, you are automatically qualified for cadet events at the Junior Olympics (if your birth year falls in the appropriate range) because of the trickle-down rule. But it does not work the other way around, meaning cadets hoping to qualify as juniors must meet the junior requirements.
What Else Should Fencers and Families Know About the Junior Olympics?
Results from Division Qualifiers: A note for fencers qualifying through Division Qualifiers: You will not be eligible to register until we receive the official results from the division chair. Emailing us screenshots from Ask Fred the day after the tournament does not count as a credible source. It typically takes anywhere from one to three days for division chairs to email results to USA Fencing and for USA Fencing to upload those results into our system. This process does not happen immediately following the competition over the weekend. Your division should send you an email following the competition to inform you that you have qualified — this is for your records only.
Competitive Memberships: It’s also important to know that if you qualify through Division Qualifiers, you need to have a Competitive membership in order to register for the Junior Olympics. We understand that some fencers who qualify for the Junior Olympics might have a lower level of membership, so we’re sharing this reminder.
Registration Required: Even if you’ve qualified, you’ll still need to register yourself or your fencer for the Junior Olympics. We do not automatically register fencers for the Junior Olympics.
Qualifying Dashboard: There is a dashboard on the bottom of each fencer’s member page that shows whether a fencer is qualified through regional points or Division Qualifiers. National points are not included in this because we must track them in a separate system because international competitions are factored into the national points list. If a fencer is listed as “pending,” know that manual override of this from the Events team at USA Fencing is required. This can take up to five business days to be switched to “approved” during the registration period. If 5 business days have passed and it still has not been switched, please send an email to nationalevents@usafencing.org.