The Northampton Fencing Center

Instructors

Coach Scott Tundermann has been fencing for over fifteen years and coaching for ten. He began coaching at Smith College in 1997, building the program from a handful of "junior varsity" fencers to a thriving team with over twenty members, competing actively in five conferences.

In 2000, Smith won the Top Club Team award at the New England Championships; in 2001, the sabre squad finished third and the team finished 7th overall. At the 2003 USACFC National Championship at the U niversity of Florida, Smith fielded the gold medal women's sabre squad (team 4th), and the team has finished in the top ten in a growing field every year since. In 2007, Smith's epee squad took the bronze.

Tundermann was nominated for 1998-1999 Coach of the Year in the Northeast Fencing Conference in recognition of the strong growth of the Smith program and his leadership in the development of women's sabre. More recently, he earned "top of the class" honors in both Sabre 1 and Epee 1 at the USFA's Coaching Development Program in 2001 and completed Sabre 2 and Epee 2 in 2002. He is also a certified Moniteur d'Armes with the USFCA and continues to develop his coaching expertise through clinics and on-going study.

In response to the demand for a place for the broader public to fence, Tundermann opened the Northampton Fencing Center in 2000. Fencers from the Center have won medals, earned competitive ratings, and qualified to Sectionals, Nationals, and the Junior Olympics. After a few iterations, the Center has transmuted into the Riverside Fencing Club in Hadley, Mass., where Tundermann still coaches. He also works with several area school groups and occasionally provides clinics and demonstrations.

In his own fencing career, Tundermann continues to compete casually at USFA events and hovers around a C rating in all three weapons. At the 2000 Summer Nationals, Tundermann finished 6th in Div III men's epee and 15th in Div II. In 1998, he studied fencing and coaching with Hungarian and Polish national masters in Szombathely. Early in his career, he finished 3rd in sabre at the NEIFC "Big One" in 1996, fencing for Hampshire College.

Coach Taro Yamashita competed for Brown University in both foil and epee from 1990-1994, where he was also the team captain or co-captain from 1992-1994. Taro was the first ever Northeast Fencing Conference Individual Epee Champion in 1994 with a league record of 29-1, and finished 3rd in the New England Championships in 1994. While Taro was at Brown, the Brown men's team won the team championship all four years.

During the 1995-1996 season, Taro was the assistant coach at MIT. Soon afterwards, he cut back on coaching to dedicate his energies to competing, so that later, he could return as a more knowledgable coach.

Under the tutelage of coach Bill Shipman, Taro became the New England Division champion in 1998 (and the runner-up every year since then through 2002), and the North Atlantic Sectional champion in 2000 (runner up in 1998, 2001, and 2002). In 2000 Taro finished 6th at Division 1-A Nationals, and in 2002 he finished 18th at the Division I National Championships. Taro has also competed internationally, competing in Senior "A" world cup events in Montreal (March 1999, 2000, and 2001) and a "B" world cup in Recklinghausen, Germany in January, 2002. Taro has been ranked as high as #302 in the world and as high as #34 in the US National rankings for men's epee.

Taro is also a founding member of the Friends of UMass Fencing, Inc., the friends and alumni support body for the UMass Fencing Team. He served as the organization's president from its inception in February, 1998 to June, 2003. He also served as the Vice President of the Friends of Brown Fencing, the parallel organization for the Brown University fencing team from 2000 to 2003.