Seemingly every time we open our Inbox, we have an email from the folks at USA Fencing with another amazing announcement: They’re doing a panel at Comic-Con, have a champagne sponsor, creating a theme song, getting colleges to create NCAA competitive programs in an era where college sports are declining, signing on celebs like actor Mandy Patinkin to be fencing ambassadors, and the list goes on!
Team Keep the Flame Alive member and USA Fencing CEO is leading that charge, and we talked with him about what a national governing body for a small Olympic sport does in non-Olympic years to boost interest and growth in the sport. Phil shows how it’s possible to think differently, try new ideas, and get great results. No idea is too out there, and Phil tells us why.
Also, the second ticket lottery for the LA 2028 Olympics is over, but that doesn’t mean all the tickets are sold! Listen to hear why you may not have been able to score any tickets in this lottery and what the Organizing Committee’s plans are for future ticket sales.
Plus, it’s two years until the LA28 Paralympics! LA celebrated by unveiling Wheelchair Basketball Square. In attendance at that event? TKFLASTANI David Davis, who wrote the history of wheelchair basketball in America.
Photo courtesy of Phil Andrews.
Note: Links to products may be affiliate links. We may earn commissions from purchases made through them.
If you liked this episode, be sure to check out:
Get more great stories in our free weekly newsletter!
TRANSCRIPT
Note: This is an uncorrected machine-generated transcript and may contain errors. Please check its accuracy against the audio. Do not quote from the transcript; use the audio as the record of note.
444-Phil Andrews USA Fencing
Theme Music
Jill Jaracz: Hello, and [00:00:30] welcome to another episode of Keep the Flame Alive, the podcast for fans of the Olympics and Paralympics. If you love the games, we are the show for you. I am your host, Jill Jaracz, joined as always by my lovely co-host, Alison Brown. Alison, hello. How are you?
Alison Brown: I’m doing okay, and we’re back. We’re back.
And we’re better than ever.
Jill Jaracz: We are. So yeah, I’ve had a fun couple weeks of, uh, storm recovery and- … a funeral going, so it’s been a, [00:01:00] it’s been a tough August. It’s been a
Alison Brown: challenge.
Jill Jaracz: Yeah. August has been tough, so thank you for everybody for, uh, hanging in there.
Alison Brown: Being patient with us- Going with it … as we get ourselves back on, on track.
Jill Jaracz: Right. G- uh, you know what, you know what’s not fun? 11 days without power. That will make you- Ugh … go wild in today’s world.
Alison Brown: And that’s the thing. It’s not so much that we can’t, you know, oh, people used to live without power all the time, but our world isn’t built for that anymore.
Jill Jaracz: Right. Right.
Alison Brown: We’re not built to [00:01:30] be without electricity, so we can’t- Right
function.
Jill Jaracz: People also relied on mail before they made decisions, you know? Mail going back and forth. Now today you have to, like, get stuff uploaded and get your claims process in for insurance and all that jazz. Oh. So yeah, it’s been, it’s been a fun couple of weeks, but I am glad to be back. I kept thinking as I was bailing out water from my mother’s sump pump so it wouldn’t flood, like being in Jesse Diggins’ pain cave or- … being, [00:02:00] like, you know, when Olympians talk about, like, there are times when it gets really low, and it got really low.
Alison Brown: Yeah.
Jill Jaracz: When, when you’re bailing out- And you- … hundreds of gallons of water
Alison Brown: and you just gotta push through. You gotta know what the goal is at the end. You gotta- Right … keep your eyes on the prize and focus and keep going.
Jill Jaracz: That we did. We had a pretty dry basement, which is, which says a whole lot when my mom’s house is below the water table. So It’s so much fun without [00:02:30] electricity.
Interview with Phil Andrews
Jill Jaracz: But you know what else is fun? Fencing. That’s right, and we are always happy when a member of Team Keep the Flame Alive comes back on the show. Phil Andrews, CEO of USA Fencing, is no exception. Uh, we wanted to touch base with him in the middle of an Olympic cycle to hear what it’s like for national governing bodies of smaller sports, what they do in order to keep that Olympic tide flowing.
So, uh, we’ll just say that Phil has been very busy.
Alison Brown: [00:03:00] Yes, he has.
Jill Jaracz: We get, press releases almost every week on some amazing new and way out there initiative that USA Fencing is doing. Uh, some of these we will talk about with Phil. They include, an anthem, a musical anthem that they are putting together for LA 2028, which includes musicians that you did not know had fencing background.
Alison Brown: this was wild.
Jill Jaracz: uh, collecting movie artifacts for a potential museum exhibit [00:03:30] at LA 2028. the fact that more colleges are offering fencing, also wild when colleges keep dropping sports. And, a new program called En Garde that is, for schools to introduce younger kids to fencing in a very low-cost method.
So, uh, we will touch on all those and much, much more with Phil. Take a listen
Phil Andrews, welcome back to Keep the Flame Alive. It is always great to have you on the show.
Phil Andrews: Thank you. Big fan, as you [00:04:00] know, of, of what you guys do and the podcast and the Keep the Flame Alive. what’s it, T-T-K-F-A-L-A-N-S-T-A-N?
Jill Jaracz: Yes, Schuck-Falstan. Yes, Schuck-Falstan. Schuck-Falstan.
Phil Andrews: Yeah. Well, and you know, I visited every stan on the planet except for Afghanistan, so I guess I could include that particular stan.
Jill Jaracz: Wow, very good. That’s incredible. so we’re in the middle of an Olympic cycle, but- Mm-hmm … it seems like you and USA [00:04:30] Fencing have not slept at all because almost every time we turn around, we get another press release saying that there’s something else you’re announcing and another program to do.
How Paris 2024 affecting interest in fencing in the U.S.
Jill Jaracz: So we’re gonna talk about how you maintain all of that in the, within a cycle, but, let’s go back to Paris first. USA was second in the medals and took home two golds, one silver, one bronze. What kind of interest did that generate in the sport back home?
Phil Andrews: You know, it, it’s tough to answer that as directly as you would think [00:05:00] because I think one of the issues with the Olympic Games is generating not only the visibility of a sport, but directly the interest, the connection to it.
it’s very interesting. I’ll give you a stat that’s probably gonna slightly surprise you, that we did a collaboration, uh, about a year later with iHeartMedia, and it’s a collaboration that continues to this day, where essentially iHeartMedia exchanges, sponsorship rights for USA Fencing for, um, advertising on iHeartRadio media stations.
So no money [00:05:30] changes hands, but they become a sponsor, and we get a lot of advertising on their radio networks, and-
Jill Jaracz: Which I have heard, by the way. You
Phil Andrews: have? Wonderful.
Jill Jaracz: I have heard that in the wild, yes.
Phil Andrews: Yeah, so we’re- that’s still going. the next group will be in Q3, so that’ll be towards the end of the summer, end of August, sort of coming into September.
we try to time that with sort of the peak sign-up times for our clubs because ultimately what we’re trying to do is get people to the front door and try fencing. Anyway, because that has a direct call [00:06:00] to action, so in other words, it tells you go and go to tryfencing.org, that actually drove more people to our Find a Club and sort of Try Fencing pages than the Olympic Games did itself.
And now we’ve done, I think it’s four campaigns with iHeartMedia and Cumulus Media, which is sometimes known as Westwood One, between them. Those all outrank the Games, which you wouldn’t think that’s the case. Now, it’s unquestionably the case that more people saw fencing during the, the Summer Olympic Games, so it’s, it’s [00:06:30] about that sort of connection to the sport and, and how do I actually go and try this is a big part of it.
So- Our success in Paris was amazing. We had a wonderful, beautiful venue at the Grand Palais. Obviously, the all-American final between Lee Kiefer and Lauren Scruggs was a really big moment for us. Beating the Italians in, in women’s team foil, massive moment. That’s a bit like beating the US in women’s basketball.
Nick Kidn’s bronze, it was also, you [00:07:00] know, a, a great, uh, icing on the cake. And yes, you know, we, we hoped for medals in sabre, um, we didn’t see them, but you can’t have them all. but you know, ultimately being very top of the medal table along with Japan in France, arguably the home of the sport, was special.
And it- there was a lot of interest that came from that, but there was also a lot of interest partly from, we came sixth in earned media versus 12th in Tokyo. So sixth sounds like, oh, we had a sort of middle of the pack. Well, think [00:07:30] about there’s over 30 sports, and then think about the ones that are naturally gonna generate that very large amount of interest, the soccers of the world, the basketballs of the world, the gymnastics of the world, and therefore who we actually outranked was quite impressive to, to at least me.
And frankly, as I looked at setting goals for LA, if we can come in sixth again, especially with the addition of, classical American sports like baseball and softball coming into the games, I’m pretty happy with that. So it [00:08:00] did generate a lot of interest, but I think it was What we did to build on that, that helped with that.
and I think, you know, I, I’ve said recently we go into the games and we compete, and everyone goes, “Well, yeah, Phil, we get it. You compete against Japan, France, and Italy, and Hungary, and, and, and now Russia coming back.” No, we also compete to an extent for attention and for recognition, especially United States.
In some countries, you win, you know, maybe [00:08:30] let’s say 10 medals or five. We win over 100 and… I think over 120 or over 130. I should know that number, I apologize. And of that, we won four, and we did really well. So it’s challenging to get that attention in the US market because there’s so much good that’s happening across the entire Team USA, and that’s a really great thing.
We win the medal count. And at home, that’ll be even more of a great thing. That’ll be special. I’ve been through a home game. Believe me, that’s gonna [00:09:00] be amazing as an American to be part of. But at the same time, our disadvantage in the US is exactly the same thing. It’s we have so much success that in most countries, Nick Itkin with a bronze medal would be a national hero.
But instead, not enough people know who Nick Itkin is. And same thing, Lauren and Lee having that moment of that all-American final, in many countries, whether it be [00:09:30] fencing or any other sport, would be an absolute national moment of pride. And a lot of people did see it, and a lot of people did comment on it.
A lot of people do remember that. But our job as USA Fencing is to make the most of those moments, and I think that’s, you know, to your opening remarks, that’s kind of what we’re trying to do, is that flame to flame piece between Paris and Los Angeles, is trying to keep as much as we can fencing in the forefront of people’s minds.
How Phil Andrews’ role at USA Fencing differs from his previous role at USA Weightlifting
Jill Jaracz: So in a sense, [00:10:00] I wanted to know, like, how does that differ from your previous role in weightlifting, which also a small sport- Yep … also would win one or two medals, or a handful. Yep. Do you find you’re doing the same thing in a different sport, or is the strategy different, or, Are your boards different, to be quite honest, and, and want different things?
Phil Andrews: I think yes, yes, and yes. I think there’s some honesty to… When I came into US Weightlifting in [00:10:30] ’13, we were not doing very well on the field of play. And there was a number of reasons for that. Uh, so the biggest challenges were in the performance side of the house. there was a… It was a small NGB, very small, uh, especially compared to fencing today.
Uh, but even compared to fencing when I showed up, fencing was a bigger NGB. A lot of people didn’t think it was, to your point, and I think the way I’d phrase that is fencing is a bigger sport, weightlifting is a bigger activity. so in other words, there’s more people who lift a snatch, the clean and jerk in this country than, fence, quite likely.[00:11:00]
But there’s more people who fence in USA Fencing and competitively fence than there is engage in competitive weightlifting. And you see that pattern across things like table tennis, perhaps, uh, is the most prominent of them, where you’ve got very, very, very significant, participation in table tennis, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into competitive table tennis.
I think one of the biggest factors that’s different between weightlifting and fencing is fencing’s largely a youth sport that goes through to the NCAA and then onto the [00:11:30] Olympic and Paralympic Games. And of course, we have a wonderful veterans community. While weightlifting, you have slightly different tactics applied there.
It’s… You start later, generally, than fencing. Um, you start generally in your late teens and maybe even your 20s. Many of our athletes who are very successful in weightlifting had a previous career in a previous sport. So, Kate Vibert, for example, Olympic silver medalist in Tokyo, uh, she was a gymnast.
Morgan King, who, uh, is an [00:12:00] Olympian in 2016, she was a soccer player in the NCAA. Mary Thiessen-Lappen, who was in, 2024 in Paris, uh, she was a thrower who we recruited through a recruitment program that was built while I was there. and so it’s, it’s, it’s slightly different in that sense. I think there’s a little bit also of, quite frankly, uh, experience that goes into it, that, you know, I, I’ve taken less time to do things here maybe than I did in weightlifting, because just your experience of running an NGB and understanding what an NGB really [00:12:30] does, and I think sometimes that does take time to understand.
and ultimately- Understanding that in order for us to… Perhaps even there is a, a link you can make there in the same way that that recruitment program in, in weightlifting produced Olympians, uh, and we use Mary as that example. knowing that that pipeline needs to be fed from the 8 to 12-year-olds, even 6 to 12-year-olds joining fencing because of the time it takes for that skill acquisition.
There’s exceptions. Anne Sabula started at 15 and went [00:13:00] on to make Paris. But primarily you need to start fencing quite young in the same way you need to start figure skating or hockey young because of the skill acquisition nature of it. So the more people we have in at that, at that, at age, healthily, not getting burned out, doing the right things, the more likely it is that we’re gonna not only come in again around the same level, but maybe we’re even past Japan to be at the very top of the fencing world.
So if I have focused a little bit more perhaps here on the, [00:13:30] business side of the world as opposed to necessarily the, performance side of the world. And whilst we have a small, fairly lean staff of about 20, in weightlifting we have about half of that. So again, it’s a little bit of everything, but they are remarkably similar yet remarkably different NGBs.
But I think, you know, the, the age element of it, the collegiate element of it are fundamentally different. and perhaps demographics are fundamentally different too
USA Fencing: Relentlessly thinking outside the box
Alison Brown: So speaking of the business [00:14:00] side of things, you have been very, very busy with the business side of things.
a lot of new partnerships.
Phil Andrews: More to come … yeah,
Alison Brown: more to come. Okay. So where do you start when it comes to those business partnerships? Because you’ve really been thinking outside the box. I mean, you’re not going for- Hotbox … yeah, exactly. Not going for some obvious, choices
Phil Andrews: You know, uh, I think the most outside the box one that we’ve done recently is, is a few weeks ago we had a, a panel at [00:14:30] Comic-Con.
and what I learned is, to the best of my understanding, we’ve actually had the first ever sport panel at Comic-Con. And interestingly enough, the grand majority of our, folks in that room were fencers, or had some exposure to fencing. They’d fenced at least once in their life, or they’d done HEMA or something quite highly related to HEMA.
For those that don’t know, it’s essentially the historic version of, of fencing. So it’s, it’s more of the long sword, claymores and, and this [00:15:00] type of, of historical fencing than it is necessarily what we know in, in, in the Olympic world. and we had Bruce Dickinson from Iron Maiden on that panel, who fenced since he was 14.
We had Asher Grodman, who was fenced for Columbia and is- now stars in Ghosts on CBS. Liam McIntyre, who’s Australian, who, um, played Spartacus, and is now the new Wolverine in Insomniac Games. and then, uh, Rob Edwards, who’s actually writing a film on fencing right now. And it went really well. very good reviews.
We’re actually doing another panel [00:15:30] at Comic-Con, uh, which will have some stars from Star Wars on it. That evening we’ll do a master class in Manhattan, um, with stars of, of Star Wars, two of the largest film stars on the planet, arguably. One of the gentlemen who put together the prequel version of lightsaber, and of course, some of our Olympians.
And that’ll be open for people who are attending Comic-Con and, and fans of Star Wars through creative marketing to come and enjoy a saber master class, is what it [00:16:00] will actually boil down to. So, because of course, lightsaber is born from fencing. So that was an unusual, you know, somewhat out of the box, I guess, thing to do.
And we’re taking that same approach when it comes to, to your point, to commercial partnerships of slightly unusual ways of thinking, right from, okay, what has things in common with fencing? So blades or razors or, you know, things that might be a little bit unusual in their thinking. To who might be interested to reach the audience [00:16:30] that we have, as opposed to necessarily who is going into the Olympic world or who is investing in sport marketing.
Also doing Creator Showdown, so we’re putting in, uh, influencers against fencers in New York City in September. That’s opening up new opportunities for us because instead of attacking the sports marketing budgets, of a lot of these brands, now we’re talking to the creative marketing people Which is very interesting for us because now we’re opening up conversations that never open up for an [00:17:00] NGB normally, or for a sport brand usually.
So yeah, it, it is creative thinking. It’s thinking, you know, to your point, a little bit outside of the box. How do we make things work for people, and what do we have to offer? We do have a TV show, but we’re not the NFL or the NHL, the NBA in terms of those TV ratings. the other thing that a lot of brands look for is how many people are in your stadium.
Well, most people are looking at, let’s take the Columbus Crew for example. They have 11 people on the pitch [00:17:30] playing in the MLS, and they have about 30,000 people in the stands. Well, I’ve got two people on the, on a strip, but I’ve also got about 40,000 people in Summer Nationals through the w- entire time of Summer Nationals coming through the door.
the, the difference is that we have Primarily participation. So it’s, it’s getting people’s head around that we’re a participation-first group, rather than a, audience-first group, and that has its own challenges. We’re [00:18:00] national in nature, so we’re not like the Cleveland Browns or the New York Rangers, because if I go to a Cleveland-based business and say, “Well, look, you should sponsor us,” they’re gonna go, “Well, that sounds great.
You’ve got an event coming to Cleveland, so we can reach 10,000 Clevelanders, right?” No. You can reach 10,000 people in the city of Cleveland, but most of those people will be from New York or LA or San Francisco or DC or Boston or, or somewhere else in the US. So if you think [00:18:30] about where you go and look at your local MLS, NBA, NHL team, you’re usually gonna see, for example, a Toyota or a Ford, a GM brand or, or similar, and a lot of that money comes from the local dealerships.
So you can’t do that in a national organization like us, which is why with one or two exceptions, notably, uh, US Ski Snowboard, US Equestrian, we generally don’t see too many of those, uh, automotive deals come into the, NGB world.
USA Fencing’s new Creator Showdown
Alison Brown: You’ve nicely [00:19:00] segued to at least three other questions we had. I wanted to ask about the Creator Showdown, what that is. Now, so you said it’s influencers fencing against fencers? Yeah.
Phil Andrews: Yeah, so it’s, it’s influencers fencing against fencers, and there’s also some fencing-related challenges that, some of our creators are coming up with.
some of those are based around the brands we’re working with transparently, and then some of those are based around just what those creators believe will attract the attention of both fencers, but also their own [00:19:30] folks. So we’ve got, I think 16 total creators now, and some celebrities coming in as well.
some of those have 52 million followers across, YouTube and Instagram and TikTok, plus of course there’s also numbers on Twitch and Facebook and LinkedIn. And, um, it’s a way that we can expose the sport a little bit in a different way and to different people. So we’re hoping to s- to generate somewhere between about 60 and 150 million impressions over [00:20:00] three days in New York City, at the seaport.
And if we’re successful, that’ll be arguably, outside of the Olympic Games, the most people who’ve seen fencing at a single time
Alison Brown: Will there be a challenge to open the champagne bottle with the saber? That’s
Phil Andrews: the- I can either confirm or deny that.
Alison Brown: Talk about cross-promotion on your own, system there.
Phil Andrews: Exactly. And if you think about it, again, this comes back to, okay, well, what can we do with our sport that’s unique? And what can we do with our [00:20:30] sport that speaks to people’s experiences outside of our sport? So the champagne saber is one of them. and it’s possible we might have one of those happen during the showdown.
but what can we do with our link with the film world? So can we, you know, as part of those, challenges, could we do the Zorro Z? So the Zorro Z is three slashes with a saber, in effect. and can we do that with our creators? And it’s a very simple challenge which people understand. They’ve seen [00:21:00] the Z before.
They know what Zorro is. No one else can do that. Archery can’t do that. Weightlifting can’t do that. Judo can’t do that. Gymnastics can’t do that, because ultimately Zorro’s iconic, and it’s all around the sword
USA Fencing’s theme song
Jill Jaracz: still on the outside of the box thinking or outside of no box thinking, two other things that are looking ahead to ’28 The artifacts you’ve been collecting for a possible exhibit, and also- Yeah … the music commissioned. Let’s talk- Yes … ’cause these are both [00:21:30] very, very interesting. how did those come about, and what’s the status of them?
Phil Andrews: So the c- I think you’re talking about the Laura Karpman, theme tune, for want of a better terminology- Yes, yes … or anthem. So Laura is an Oscar-nominated composer. She was nominated for an Oscar for Marvel’s Brave New World. and is, is pretty prolific in the, in the music composition world i- in, in movies.
Um, she actually proactively offered that up. she is in the writing phase of that right now, and then the plan [00:22:00] is for us to record that with other fencing musicians. So we went out to our audience, uh, our membership, and we found about 1,000 musicians, some of which are all the way from professional musicians all the way to, ” I play the piano, I’m okay at it.”
but there’s a hell of a lot of very, very talented musicians, in there who’ve got significant accolades in music, which doesn’t surprise me, knowing the fencing audience, but might surprise most people looking at a sporting [00:22:30] audience. so the idea is that Laura will compose, and then the music itself will come from some of those, fencers, many of whom are college fencers.
some of whom I might, I sort of digest, but I think this is legitimately true, that the only sport where Julliard could potentially field a really good varsity team, a competitive varsity team, might be fencing. and of course, um, Laura herself is a graduate of Julliard. And then we have some other, notable perhaps [00:23:00] musicians in, in the fencing world.
So, Bruce Dickinson, I mentioned earlier, was part of our Comic-Con panel. Of course, he’s British, but he has won international medals in, in veteran fencing. he fenced- started fencing in high school. mildly related, Jonathan Davis from Korn, he’s gonna be fencing with us in Los Angeles soon.
He fenced, uh, when he was younger as well. one that a lot of people don’t realize is Neil Diamond was a fencer for New York University, NYU. he’s not gonna necessarily be a part of that particular piece. Unfortunately, [00:23:30] his health is not in a place where he can. but Neil is. Embe Hold, who’s a now fairly popular, singer, uh, she’s been in the top 20 of w- or top 20, uh, I believe in, in Billboard, and about, you know, 500,000 followers now.
She actually fenced for University of California San Diego and, her family is still involved in fencing in the San Diego area. so there’s, there’s a f- three or four fairly notable musicians who are involved in fencing and, and continue to be so, and [00:24:00] Neil’s probably the one that surprises the most people.
Jill Jaracz: so wait, did you just get a call one day going, “Hey, Phil, fencing needs a theme song”?
Phil Andrews: I mean, pretty much. Uh, Laura and I sat down at the, North American Cup, which is one of our national events, and we had a bite to eat in Salt Lake City, and that’s where sort of we came up with a number of ideas where her media and entertainment experience could be helpful to growing fencing.
And, um, that [00:24:30] was one of the ideas that she had. So, we were not gonna let that particular gift horse in the mouth.
Jill Jaracz: where will you use this?
Phil Andrews: So I mean, if you think about the Olympic theme tune, that sort of iconic, music, and I, I did know the name of it at one stage, but I, I m- I must admit I’m forgetting it now, but we all hear it.
there’s sort of two, the NBC version and the IOC version, dun, dun, dun-dun. Like, you hear it all the time. So sort of our vision, uh, and by ours, I’m probably talking myself and, and our, our CMO [00:25:00] here at USA Fencing, Brian Windell, is to use it when we’re displaying the Olympic rankings. So, you know, that journey that will start in October, November with our first domestic, events of the season, and then the first, um, events of the FIE season and the WPF or
parafencing seasons, that’s a, I think, a good time where we can s- use those, that, that tune, for want of better terminology, in order for us to display the rankings on our social media, et cetera. We can use [00:25:30] it for our medal stand just in the same way that NBC and the IOC do.
Pulling together a museum exhibit
Jill Jaracz: What about the artifacts and the museum exhibit
Phil Andrews: So the idea around the museum is, uh, we talked earlier a little bit about some of the iconic movies, Zorro, Princess Bride, Star Wars, James Bond’s Die Another Day, The Three Musketeers.
I can go on and on. There’s over 600 people who have wield a, a sword or, other, blade implement in a film or in [00:26:00] entertainment. and we’ve cataloged all of them. Some of them are going to be ambassadors for us for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. So, as part of sort of that same theme, we’ve partnered up with the, uh, Academy Museum, through some contacts that we made very kindly through people who connected us.
And the proposal is that we’ll bring together some of these artifacts and historic moments from, the movie world, and be able to display them as part of, a sort of [00:26:30] ode to the Olympics, an ode to fencing, along with the Academy. Which, by the way, will have its first stunt Oscar in 2028, and, um, of course, that’s where fencing really shows up, through the godfather or grandfather of sword work in, in film, which arguably is Bob Anderson, a British Olympian in sabre
Alison Brown: And so many of the Olympians, when I spoke to them, talked about being inspired by various appearances of fencing in movies and [00:27:00] TV.
So it only makes perfect sense that they would then- That’s exactly it … turn around and say, “Oh, that was the movie.” You know, the joke became what color would your lightsaber be? Oh, yeah. That I was asking them, and they all had an answer.
Phil Andrews: 100%. I mean, it, it’s, you know, uh, we did a collaboration, and we’re gonna do a larger collaboration all the way through the Olympic Games with MOCA, which is the Museum of Chinese in America.
they put on sort of panel with, uh, the head coach of UPenn and with Alex Massialas and with Maya [00:27:30] Chamberlain.
And Maya did not at that time know, the program that we were putting together, uh, around film and those ambassadors. And she literally named one of our ambassadors in her intro of how she found the sport. And, you know, it was, you know, “I, I like Pirates of the Caribbean. I like Star Wars. I’m gonna go to this camp that my mom set up for me in Lin Chan.”
And, um, it was just so funny ’cause I actually had to leave to go downstairs [00:28:00] in, in the MOCA to actually have a discussion about another one of our potential ambassadors. and it was, uh, I later sort of clued Maya in on the fact that one of those people that inspired her to become a fencer is now one of our worldwide ambassadors for the sport.
And, you know, again, I, uh, sort of was like, “Well,” but I did not even prompt that in any way, shape, or form. But to your point, Alison, you know, it, it’s almost every fencer can tell s- trace back their [00:28:30] participation and their inspiration usually to something along those lines
Update on USA Fencing’s sponsorship collaboration
Jill Jaracz: How is the sponsorship collaboration going with the four other NGBs that you’ve partnered with, squash and, , sailing and rowing and, uh, I ha- I know I have it.
Phil Andrews: Cycling.
Jill Jaracz: Cycling, thank you. And so- That one seems like the outlier to me, to be quite honest.
I don’t know why, but it does.
Phil Andrews: It, it, it is a little bit because if you think about the other ones, they’re all very college-focused. And sort of we had this discussion a little bit earlier about weightlifting versus fencing. [00:29:00] And, uh, you know, in all honesty, cycling we’re very excited to get involved and, and that’s part of the reason that we sort of said yes, as it were, to cycling coming in.
And, actually squash has bowed out because they’re working with Octagon and- Okay … so we’re boarding lacrosse instead. And it’s going okay. You know, I think it’s turned into a little bit more of, a best practices and almost lead sharing environment. we’re talking at the moment with a potential [00:29:30] joint partnership between us and, and, and US Rowing on one.
Uh, we had one partner that came in that’s, that’s turned into a, an only US Rowing partner. We’ve had a couple that came in that turned into only US Fencing partners. but there’s definitely more, you know, a bit of range of course that was across all of us. there’s definitely more good than, than bad to it and I think as we get into, a position now where we’re starting to get into what I might call Olympic brands looking for activations [00:30:00] period.
So two years into the games, a lot of the brands who’ve partnered with LA28 are now going, “Okay, what do I do now?” So I think that’s where we’ll really see some major advantages,
Jill Jaracz: do you think sponsors have a trouble wrapping their head around working with multiple NGBs versus you working together to get one sponsor for all of you?
Phil Andrews: I think it’s a little bit of both.
I think there’s, there’s a few challenges that one has to overcome, particularly with [00:30:30] folks who are trying to lean into, it’s almost brand new to work with NGBs, uh, and work with the Olympic world and Paralympic world. There’s a lot of education that’s needed of what, well, what is…
Who, uh, who owns the rings? You know, what does an LA28 do? What does an Olympic Committee do? What does, uh, you know, a USA Fencing do? and who owns what rights? and who owns the database? And, and all of this type of items, which for me and for you guys is very clear because we’re involved day-to-day in the Olympic and Paralympic [00:31:00] world, so you understand very clearly what a USA Fencing does, what an LA28 does, or a Milan Cortina does, or what a US Olympic or Paralympic Committee does, what an IOC does, what an IPC does.
All of those things are abundantly clear to you and to basically everybody listening to this podcast. But to a lot of brands who, you know, they see the Olympics on NBC, they’re not really aware that there’s a whole layer of competition beneath that in any way, shape, or form. So it’s- An educational piece, I [00:31:30] think, for them to understand that in the same way that if you partner with the NHL, that’s the whole NHL, doesn’t necessarily give you the Colorado Avalanche.
It might, depending on the terms of the agreement, but it doesn’t necessarily give you the Colorado Avalanche or the Chicago Blackhawks. so the understanding of the full ecosystem has to be taught a little bit. and I think the understanding of why it might make sense for a brand to come in and partner with more than one national governing body [00:32:00] has to be taught as well.
So, and it all depends on your rationale. So for example, I’m talking to a group right now where their rationale is that fencing is a, is a sport where a lot of people go into very, very high-end universities. So their rationale is, we would like to build a relationship with those people in order that they might come and work for our company.
Great. That’s perfect for us. But that similar rationale probably applies in, in a number of other sports like r- like rowing, for example, like squash for example, where they’re NESCAC heavy or they’re [00:32:30] Ivy heavy, or they’re top end university heavy. Doesn’t mean everybody goes to those universities, but it does mean that they’re in and around those universities.
So that’s where I think there’s advantages of saying, oh, actually you could work with us and rowing together and potentially lacrosse and so on. so I think it all depends on the personalization to the individual brand and the personalization to the individual goals of that brand that are coming in, whether they be an Olympic partner that’s looking to make [00:33:00] the most of their partnership with the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games or, or their top partnership with the IOC, where they are really looking to build upon their access to the rings that they’ve already purchased in the IP, and now they’re looking to activate against that.
So therefore they wanna reach, you know, for a better terminology, Olympic super fans. So maybe they should reach out to you guys and it’s sponsor the podcast too. But you know, that’s a way that you can reach, nearly best part of 20 million [00:33:30] members of national governing bodies together. So, coming in, being able to, for want of a better terminology, buy the rights to some of those national governing bodies is a really good way for Olym- or existing Olympic and Paralympic partners to reach down into the people who understand the Olympic and Paralympic world and value that world.
Same way that you saw some of the FIFA partners for the World Cup sure enough, go and partner with US Soccer or Canadian Soccer or the English FA
Alison Brown: how careful do you have to be with those kind [00:34:00] of, activations on not stepping on the other group’s toes? Like, if you’re dealing with- Mm-hmm … a top sponsor who’s trying to work with you as, as part of that, that’s gotta be a little tricky.
Phil Andrews: It is a bit. And, uh, and the opposite’s true as well, where you’re, you have somebody who is l- looking to partner with a national governing body or is interested in partnering with us, and they are the competitor of a top sponsor or an LA28 partner.
Th- there’s good and bad to both of those. [00:34:30] and good and bad, in a sense of when you, when you’re all aligned and that brand has access to the rings or the agitos, in many ways that makes life easy because when you come to the Olympic Games or you come to the Olympic trials, they own both sides of the rights.
and that’s really nice and easy. it makes that a lot smoother an experience. And I think it’s, uh, you know, uh, the opposite’s somewhat true, with non-Olympic brands or Paralympic brands who are coming in and want to sponsor us. You have to be just [00:35:00] really clear from the outset what we own and what we don’t own.
We don’t own the rights to the agitos or the rings. We can use them as part of our own, promotion and our own, uh, world, alongside our own logo, but we can’t use them and sell them. That’s not our right. That’s the IPC and, and, and the IOC, and underneath them, the LA28 Games can s- also sell them. that’s not what we can do.
[00:35:30] We can offer you fencing. We can offer you our logo. We can offer you our events. We can offer you our people and our database and our TV show. And I think that’s where you have to j- again, just be particularly, upfront with what we own, what we don’t, and what we can offer and what we don’t. And, and ultimately, you know, frankly, there’s a difference in price point of if you’re gonna sponsor the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games or the IOC, you’re significantly gonna pay for the IP of the Olympic [00:36:00] rings.
And, the IOC and all of the, uh, Olympic and Paralympic committees and the IPC and so on have spent, you know, hundreds of years or tens of years in the IPC’s case building the brand. So there’s a fee that goes attached to that
Phil Andrews on growing the sport in schools and colleges
Jill Jaracz: Let’s switch over to growing the sport. And there’s two ways that we’ve seen that are slightly different, but also leaning into a tried and true method. You’ve got, a big effort going on to grow fencing at the collegiate level by adding [00:36:30] more colleges. And you’ve got this new On Guard fencing program in elementary to high schools.
l- let’s talk about getting the colleges first. What goes into getting a college on board with adding fencing, especially when other sports are getting dropped from college programs?
Phil Andrews: I think what you have to remember a lot of the time is when you’re talking to a college, or, or really, I mean, even the sponsorship discussion is pretty similar, you have to understand the goals of the person at the other side of the table and not necessarily pushing your own goals.
My goal is [00:37:00] growing fencing opportunities for fencers. And therefore, as a result of that, you would hope growing the pipeline because know, as a result of there being more college opportunities, more incentive to stay in fencing, and more incentive perhaps even to come into fencing in the first place, certainly for the higher academic additions like a Trinity College.
with that said, the other person at the other side of the table might love fencing, and they might not. But their goals are orientated to that particular university or that particular athletic department. And, and more often than [00:37:30] not, it’s not just the athletic director you’ve got to persuade. It’s actually the equivalent of the VP for enrollment or the sort of chief business person of the university, and typically, the president of the university.
And the president’s arguably the most important person We’re … It’s not been announced yet, and probably won’t even by the time the c- podcast publishes, because we’re waiting for the new academic year. But we’re going to be, uh, announcing our first HBCU. and, you know, ultimately that took a lot of work on everybody’s side.[00:38:00]
So a lot of those items in today’s world come down to the enrollment cliff. So that’s a challenge being faced by academic institutions where, in the simplest possible terms, there’s less kids going to college than there used to be, because there’s less kids of that age in the United States than there were five, 10 years ago.
and we’ve just hit in the last couple of years that the beginning of that real enrollment cliff. People knew it was coming. So over the next few years, you’re likely to see [00:38:30] a number of colleges either shut down or merge or purchase each other. And by that, I don’t just mean private institutions or for-profit institutions, I mean including, nonprofit institutions as well.
And you’ve, you’ve already seen some of that happen, with mergers of colleges in the Northeast, the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, perhaps the most high-profile complete close of a university. and you could see it if you just simply pull some of the finances of some of the, uh, nonprofit universities which are public, [00:39:00] then you can see that they’re drawing down on their, their endowment, on occasion, uh, to survive, quite frankly and that’s not because they’re bad institutions.
It’s because they’re, that there’s just the challenges befalling the education industry right now. Uh, at the higher end, someone like a Trinity with relatively thin enrollment, so a very small college, where fencing can be interesting is we can add a academically qualified sport [00:39:30] where they can suddenly add 24 fencers in D3, most of whom are likely to be paying the standardized tuition rates because it’s D3 and are qualified, academic students, which is a very unusual combination, uh, and attractive to someone like a Trinity College Connecticut, when the, A, there’s a little bit of a fencing history as well there, but B, they happen to sit dead center of a significant area of the fencing world between Massachusetts and, [00:40:00] and, and New York City, where they’re in almost dead center of the best recruiting ground they could possibly be in.
So it’s, it’s sort of a match made in heaven in a lot of ways of a high-ranking institution which our students want to be at, meeting an institution that wants to grow its enrollment through sport, but with appropriate people to go to that college. And so again, it’s all about remembering what the person on the other side of the table is really looking to do.
What’s gonna make their university tick? What’s gonna make their [00:40:30] university say yes? When they’re sitting around the board of trustees or the president, that person may or may not love fencing, but what’s gonna make a difference for them? That’s the discussion that’s got to be had, not what’s gonna make a difference for us
Jill Jaracz: What about the On Guard fencing program?
Phil Andrews: On Guard is really an effort for us to bring fencing to new audiences, that are not seeing it existingly. We’re not in a lot of schools. That needs to be addressed. So bringing the sport in, and we’ve talked a number of things about the Creative [00:41:00] Showdown and the lightsaber stuff and all the different ways we’re trying to bring fencing to people and the iHeartMedia deal.
This is not horribly dissimilar to that. there is an element of bringing fencing at an affordable rate to people, although I think the Fencing Sprouts program does that perhaps more aggressively. On Guard is more of an attempt to take fencing to places it’s not right now and put a sword into people’s hands, basically.
and at an affordable rate where it’s not gonna cost people a lot of money to start. and it’s also an [00:41:30] entryway into the school’s world. So, theoretically, if you can generate demand at the middle school level, for example, that will actually translate into high school. So now we– it becomes easier for us to add fencing when people are in high school.
and of course, that’s an area that we do want to focus on some, because ultimately, at the moment, one of the issues we face in fencing is that we’re only a varsity sport at the state-sanctioned level in the state of New Jersey. Uh, and [00:42:00] we’re close in a couple of other states,
we have New York City as well, but we’re only state-sanctioned in the state of New Jersey. Obviously, we’d like to add New York State, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Illinois, Georgia, and some of the other places where there’s good groundswell of schools, but we’ve not quite got to the point where we’re tipping the balance for the state side.
What’s on the horizon for USA Fencing
Alison Brown: What have we missed? What is a, something coming down the pike that we haven’t asked you about?
Phil Andrews: Uh, we’ve talked about Creative Showdown. We’re creating, uh, a New York, New Jersey permanent cup in the, in the biggest market for fencing, so I think [00:42:30] that’s quite exciting.
We’re, launching BoutCaster with our friends at Cloudflare, which is the world’s largest direct-to-consumer platform. We didn’t set out to create the world’s largest direct-to-consumer platform, but yet we have. it’s just because of the size of our events, and, uh, it’s, this, uh, we have two folks involved, David Barraf and Zebby Lawrence, who’ve been utterly amazing.
they’re right down to, uh, David figuring out how to use AI to move a camera up and down a strip, make it follow a fencer and not the [00:43:00] referee, and doing the mathematical equation of the amount that a camera will move, and therefore the amount that the AI needs to factor that the fencers have moved, the amount of degrees across 120 strips.
It’s remarkable. the man is, is utterly amazing. and, uh, we’re working on a lot of technology to how we present fencing, especially to new folks. we’ve talked a little bit about the ambassador program and how we’re leaning into, uh, members of [00:43:30] the sort of media world to help us grow. We talked about Comic-Con.
So yeah, we’ve done a few interesting things, and, you know, now we’re leaning into, how can we go over into the chess and the gaming worlds where we know we have a lot of people who share the same personality traits as fencers and bring them into fencing. how we’re leaning into our colleagues and, uh, friends in the Asian-American community, which is 48% of fencers.
So our collaborations with the American A- the Asian American Foundation, with Mocha, [00:44:00] We’re doing a lot of conferences and shows now. So we just did Aspen Ideas. Uh, we’re doing a collaboration with Chief Executives Group. We’re doing Cannes next year actually in France, where Cannes Sport have asked us to come over and do basically equivalent of Creator Showdown with them.
and we’re doing Tokyo X, we’re doing KCON. It’s– We’re, we’re trying to show up in a lot of different places where you wouldn’t necessarily expect fencing, in order to just frankly put a sword in people’s hands [00:44:30] and encourage them to go try fencing. That’s how we try to grow and, and get us into the, into other people’s audiences.
We’re good at, good historically at talking to ourselves, to fencers. What we need to do, and I think a lot of NGBs in sports need to do as we get to 2028 and this moment where people are willing to listen to NGBs and listen to Olympic sport and Paralympic sport, is get ourselves into new positions and new audiences which are not familiar with our sports, and do that in a way that is [00:45:00] native to, to your sport.
In our world, Comic-Con’s a great fit. In weightlifting, yeah, not so much. uh, the gaming’s a great fit. Chess is a great fit. Music is even a great fit. In, you know, when I think about when I was in weightlifting, those things are less of a good fit. but our goal is to leave no stone, at least peeked under, if not overturned before ’28, that, that requires a, a modicum of effort to do [00:45:30] it, in order to grow this sport
Jill Jaracz: Excellent.
Phil, thank you so much. It’s always great to have you on.
Phil Andrews: No, you guys too. It’s a big fan of, of the podcast, and I love the passion you guys bring to the table every single time and every single games, and the knowledge it takes to run a podcast like this across so many different sports is, remarkable.
So well done. Congratulations.
Alison Brown: Thank you.
Jill Jaracz: Thank you so much, Phil. by the time you listen to this, USA Fencing will have done, like, 20 more things.
Alison Brown: It’s [00:46:00] true. So- The- no, no grass grows under their feet, that is for sure.
Jill Jaracz: No. Oh my goodness. if y- if you want a challenging job, like, and coming up with cool, innovative new things, like, go look at working at USA Fencing.
Like, they are willing to try anything , to reach their goals, and that’s, really cool.
Alison Brown: And they’re pretty fabulous people.
Jill Jaracz: They are fabulous people. So, so follow them at USA Fencing.
LA 2028 News: Ticket updates
Alison Brown: We have tickets.
Jill Jaracz: We still have tickets.
Alison Brown: Or, [00:46:30] or we don’t have tickets. There’s a lot of people who got no tickets in this ticket drop.
Jill Jaracz: Yes, so the second ticket lottery for LA 2028 is over. Also, the ticket lottery process is over, and LA ’28 announced that over six million tickets were sold overall, and, uh, a lot of people did not get stuff in ticket drop number two, and a lot of expensive stuff was going on in ticket drop two.
Alison Brown: Yes, it was expensive, it was limited, and not a lot of [00:47:00] people seemed, at least in our circles, seemed to get spots in the lottery, which surprised me.
Jill Jaracz: Right. Right. So when LA said that over six million tickets were sold, it went back and looked at other announcements. So ticket drop one sold about four million tickets, so there were half as many tickets available in drop two as there were in drop one.
Also, they didn’t sell everything. So, just because you didn’t get in the lottery and the lottery process is over doesn’t mean that tickets are [00:47:30] done too. They are, going to have first come, first serve ticket sales starting in 2027. Nothing has been announced beyond that. LA ’28 said there’s about 14 million available tickets for both the Olympics and Paralympics, so that’s like 10 and a half million for the Olympics, three and a half million for Paralympics.
That means there’s like five million Olympic tickets left.
Alison Brown: And- Just
Jill Jaracz: about …
Alison Brown: all the Paralympic- Yes … tickets left because we haven’t even started on those sales.
Jill Jaracz: Right. So [00:48:00] plenty of opportunity. Plus, I don’t think they know exactly how many tickets they have because venues haven’t been fully finalized in terms of layout and where the press goes and where broadcast needs to have their things and where security is gonna be.
So there could be more seats put in. We just don’t know, and they don’t know. So there’s gonna be seats a-plenty. in 2027 Olympic tickets will become available again, first come, first serve on those. If you’ve already purchased tickets and they, remember they had that [00:48:30] 12-ticket limit per account, that ticket limit is gone now.
So if you’ve maxed out before, you can buy tickets again. You will have to have an LA ’28 ID or account in order to purchase, but beyond that, there’s no special recognition thing like the lotteries had. every sport on the program is gonna have tickets available. And our friend Rich Pearlman at the Sports Examiner has been following World Rowing’s Congress meeting that’s been going on, and LA28’s rowing [00:49:00] sports manager had a presentation there and said that there are still rowing and coastal rowing tickets available, and their strategy has been to include a small number of tickets in every drop in order to make tickets continually available.
Alison Brown: So the idea being , they aren’t only dropping, say, 10% in any of these pieces, and then you’ll still always have tickets available whenever they do the, first come, first serve sales.
Jill Jaracz: Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And we [00:49:30] don’t quite know those percentages for sure- Right … but that’s an example. but yeah, exactly.
So I, I don’t think any of the sports have wanted to be giving all of their t- tickets up for sale in drop one or drop two.
Alison Brown: So will there be less expensive tickets available? Probably. Maybe. We’ll have to see. And we won’t even be talking about the resale platform probably for another year and change.
Jill Jaracz: Yeah. That’s supposed to come up sometime [00:50:00] now in 2027.
Alison Brown: Right.
Jill Jaracz: And, it’ll be interesting to see how that works. I hope they’ve learned some lessons from the World Cup.
Alison Brown: Right. And Paris.
Jill Jaracz: Yeah, and but it’s just such a different system from Paris because resale over there wasn’t allowed to, it had to be face value.
Alison Brown: Right.
Jill Jaracz: So we’re on a dynamic pricing system here in the US. How much will tickets go up? Will they go down? Will [00:50:30] people say no to Olympic tickets and suddenly there’s a glut of them? We don’t know.
Alison Brown: We’ll find out. So the short answer is, if you didn’t get tickets in this drop, do not even panic for one moment.
There are plenty of tickets still to come. There’s plenty of opportunities, and it’s two years. You know? Yeah. Not to worry. Because so many people have bought tickets but haven’t thought out the whole process. You know, they may find they can’t get accommodations that they’re [00:51:00] comfortable with, or they can’t get the transportation that they thought they could, and then those tickets will come back on.
So talk about dynamic pricing. There’s g- this is a dynamic process-
Jill Jaracz: Yes …
Alison Brown: when you’ve got so much time, ahead of the event.
Jill Jaracz: Yes. And, and I’ve already seen complaints about Airbnb because I believe their calendar has opened up for- Oh, geez … yeah. Yeah, two years ahead of time. It’s already not pretty. So, uh, we will see how that goes, but yeah, still plenty of time if you haven’t gotten [00:51:30] tickets.
Two years until the LA28 Paralympics!
Jill Jaracz: Also, uh, speaking of two years to go, it’s two years until the Paralympics.
Alison Brown: Very exciting.
Jill Jaracz: Very, very exciting. As part of that celebration, LA des- designated the intersection of Victory Boulevard and Balboa Boulevard as Wheelchair Basketball Square to commemorate the first ever wheelchair basketball game, which took place there at the former Birmingham Veterans Administration Hospital.
Team Keep the Flame Alive member, author David Davis, was asked to be part of that [00:52:00] celebration.
Alison Brown: Oh, fantastic, because of the book.
Jill Jaracz: Yes, because of his book, “Wheels of Courage.” If you are a longtime listener, you’ll know that, David wrote a fantastic history of wheelchair basketball. And, uh, he came on the show to talk about it, and, it was a great interview.
History of the sport is fascinating. David is an amazing writer. So, uh, if you haven’t heard that interview, we’ll link to it in the show notes, but also check out his book, “Wheels of Courage” as well. Not so fun [00:52:30] news.
Alison Brown: We al- we always have to have something- Yeah,
Jill Jaracz: I know. We got to
Alison Brown: balance it
Jill Jaracz: out … to
Alison Brown: bring us down.
Possible tree removal at the equestrian venue
Jill Jaracz: Yeah, exactly. So the Sports Examiner and KTLA also report that, uh, LA ’28 equestrian venue Santa Anita Park wants to remove 34 trees in order to create a permanent equestrian eventing course. not surprisingly, this has created some backlash among local residents who say this will disrupt na- animals’ natural habitats.
No decisions have been made at this time. , I can tell you an easy way to get rid of 34 [00:53:00] trees.
Alison Brown: Have a tornado?
Jill Jaracz: Yes, have a tornado come through. Get rid of them real quick. Nobody’s able to say anything about that, Mother Nature. and then one other fun LA Olympics note, because we don’t typically talk about qualifying because there’s a lot of sports and it’s a lot to keep track of, and we just don’t have that capacity here.
Volleyball qualifiers: A first-time nation heading to the Olympics
Jill Jaracz: But I saw this headline, got excited. Thailand won the 2026 AVC Women’s Basket- Volleyball. Thailand won the [00:53:30] 2026 AVC Women’s Volleyball Asian Championship. They beat China to do so and qualified for the Olympics. This will be the first time Thailand will be in women’s volleyball at the Olympics.
Alison Brown: Oh, that’s– And you know Thailand is gonna come up with the best opening ceremonies outfits.
They’re one of those countries- Oh … that always bring it, right? Yeah. ‘Cause they bring a lot of the traditional elements in.
Jill Jaracz: Yeah.
Alison Brown: So this’ll be a whole, you know, usually there’s just a handful of Thai athletes, you know? There’s a- Yeah … [00:54:00] but now there’s gonna be a whole volleyball team.
Jill Jaracz: Yes, it’s gonna be fantastic, so congratulations to Thailand.
I always love it when a new country gets in to-
Alison Brown: Yes … a,
Jill Jaracz: an Olympics-
Alison Brown: That’s exciting …
Jill Jaracz: that means that’s good for the sport, so and that’s good for this episode, so we will get it wrapped before Mother Nature calls again.
Alison Brown: Oh, don’t even joke about that.
Jill Jaracz: I don’t wanna know what’s next for, for us, but, , we will be back next week with more stories from the land of the Olympics and Paralympics.
Thank you so much for [00:54:30] listening.
Alison Brown: And until next time, keep the flame alive.