Centereach's Charles Pedersen goes 16-1 to win Suffolk boys foil championship
Charles Pedersen of Centereach celebrates after winning a boys foil match at the Suffolk fencing individual championships at Half Hollow Hills East on Saturday. Credit: /Derrick Dingle
Shoreham-Wading River senior Charles Pedersen turned someone else’s potential three-peat into the best accomplishment of his career at the Suffolk boys fencing championship match.
On Saturday at Half Hollow Hills East High School, Pedersen went 16-1 and won a pair of fence-offs in the final pool to become the county champion of boys foil fencers. Pedersen dethroned the back-to-back defending champion — junior Marc Lindemann of Newfield/Miller Place — to become the new king.
Pedersen and Lindemann have had several competitive bouts between each other over the years, from varsity-level matches to club-level competition at the Mission Fencing Center in Rocky Point. Ultimately, it came down to them with a fence-off bout between the two to determine the winner.
Advantage: Pedersen. After conceding the first touch, Pedersen rattled off five in a row to win it.
“It was great; I still feel like crying,” Pedersen told Newsday after the match. “It was a lot of work. Weirdly, I wasn’t worried [about the fence-off]. When you get in this mode of focus, you get so concentrated onto this one thing that you just make that one thing happen.”
Pedersen, who will be fencing in the NCAA Division III at Wheaton College in Massachusetts, is happy to end his career with the Centereach/Longwood/Shoreham-Wading River team on a high note.
“This is my last season, and it’s been a really emotional last couple of weeks,” Pedersen said. “It’s been kind of heavy-hitting. I’ve spent four years fencing with these kids now, and I love them all. It’s been a fantastic journey.”
In the boys sabre championship, Ward Melville junior William Dreyer came out on top while competing for the Ward Melville/Port Jefferson/Rocky Point team.
Dreyer has come a long way in just a year. Last year, he was reserve on the team and only competed in a couple of bouts. On Saturday, he won all 15 of his bouts to run away with the championship.
It was Dreyer’s second-to-last victory against Lindenhurst junior Ryan Erdman that clinched his county title. With the bout tied 4-4, Erdman pushed Dreyer down towards the end of the strip. With nothing left to do, Dreyer defensively stuck his blade toward Erdman and registered a hit to take it 5-4.
“He had beaten everyone else in that round, so I really thought that might’ve been the end,” Dreyer said. “I was getting towards the end of the strip, I ran out of room and my instincts just took priority and I hit him.”
Hills East sophomore Jerry Wu went 13-2 overall and 5-0 in the third pool to win the epee championship. However, he was rather pragmatic after becoming a county champion.
“Last year I went for it and didn’t succeed. This year, I did, so I guess life is good,” Wu said. “Maybe this year I’m champion, maybe next year I’m not. Maybe some other ninth grader will come along and just absolutely ruin me next year. Who knows?”
