SINGAPORE – Towering over her fencing rivals, Stephanie Lee stood out at the OCBC Arena on May 10 as she collected her gold medal in the National School Games (NSG) B Division fencing finals.
It was not only her 1.77m frame that caught the eye; the 16-year-old was also the sole representative from Tanjong Katong Girls’ School (TKGS) competing in the inter-school event.
Unbeaten from the pool stage to the final, Stephanie topped her group with six wins. She powered her way through the elimination rounds to the final two, where she defeated Daniella Tang of St Margaret’s School 15-11 to clinch the cadet women’s foil gold.
Talitha Arwen Evans of St Joseph’s Institution International and Angellena Wong (St Anthony’s Canossian Secondary) were joint-third.
Stephanie, who was there with two clubmates from the International Fencing School, said: “I’m just really grateful for the support from my parents, my coach, all my friends in school, and also my friends at the club because we train together every day.”
TKGS does not offer fencing as a co-curricular activity but it does not faze the teenager, who finished third in 2023.
She added: “I don’t think it’s really like added pressure, it’s more of an honour to be able to use my talents and skills and bring some honour and glory to the school.
“I’m also grateful for the school because they provide a lot of support. There were a few competitions where I was overseas (Italy and Thailand) and the teachers and the school were really understanding and provided support… It helped me a lot to get here today.”
After three days of competition, the Singapore Sports School was crowned the overall girls’ champion on May 10.
Team captain Jaida Quah admitted that she was nervous before the start of the season as they wanted to emulate their seniors’ success.
The 15-year-old said: “This NSG is my last, but our team managed to compete well and get some medals. There’s some pressure on us as a lot of our seniors did well, and we wanted to represent our school with pride, especially with the SSP name (on our shoulders).”
When asked about her senior Amita Berthier, who will be representing Singapore at the Paris Olympics in July, she added: “Sometimes Amita comes to our school to train and I do feel inspired since she made it to the Olympics... hopefully one day I can maybe be like her, also represent Singapore.”
It was also a special day for Hwa Chong Institution, who were crowned the overall boys’ champion for the first time since 2016.
Team captain Darius Cheng said: “I twisted my ankle a week before the NSG and all these challenges derailed us a bit.
“Even though we weren’t confident in ourselves at the start, to be able to fight through these obstacles and claim victory in the end, makes it special.”
