A quest for autonomy to reach the roof of the world. A year ago, in Cairo, Ysaora Thibus won the world title after which she was running breathlessly. In particular after the Tokyo Games where, despite the happiness of a silver medal with the French women’s foil team, the Guadeloupean had very painfully experienced her failure individually, with an elimination from the 2nd round which had left her “psychologically exhausted. After Tokyo, I took five months to recover by stopping fencing for quite a long time. It’s been a long journey to come back.” Who went through Avignon in particular, where the young woman contacted a certain Giulio Tomassini, the Italian fencing master who notably trained the legend of transalpine foil Valentina Vezzali, triple Olympic champion in 2000, 2004 and 2008. A legend.
An Italian succeeding another since Thibus previously worked with Stefano Cerioni, who himself had been a pupil of…Tomassini. A collaboration that literally boosted the Frenchwoman. From a European bronze medal in Antalya to a world title in Cairo, the Guadeloupean has regained momentum and confidence. “In Tokyo, I had a lot of pressure, especially because of my choice to go and train in Los Angeles, then in Italy,” she recalls. “Not to mention the covid which had greatly disrupted what I had put in place. My preparation had really not been optimal so that after these Games, I wanted to continue but under the conditions that I had chosen and which seemed to me the best to be efficient and my life balance. I fought a lot for that, to bring flexibility into this system, adaptability, individualization too. And the world title confirmed me in his choices. Listening to each other also pays off.”
Nevertheless, for Giulio Tomassini, the margin of progress of his French student remains important, as he confided to the newspaper L’Equipe: “With Ysa, it was simple. I had known her for a while and I always thought that I would have liked to train her. As soon as I put on the mask, there was a direct relationship between us, we formed the master-student couple on an emotional and physical level. It came right away. He still has a lot of work to do mentally, physically and technically, which we are slowly putting in place. The world title was just one step. This is confirmed by the results. Since the start of 2023, Ysaora Thibus has strung the World Cup podiums like pearls on a necklace: 3rd in Paris in January, 2nd in Plovdiv in May, 3rd in Tbilisi in June, all accompanied by a Grand Prix victory in Turin and a 3rd place in Shanghai.
An exceptional regularity which delights the French foil fencer: “When you manage to have a stable system, with good foundations, this is reflected in competition. To be world champion was still to reach a Holy Grail on a personal level, but to be consistent means something else to me. This means that I control my sport, my emotions. And even when things are not going well, I still manage to perform. I no longer wait for all the lights to be green to shine. It’s difficult to be 100% for a whole season. There are bound to be ups and downs. But when I manage to get them to not be too bad, it’s a real satisfaction. A stability that Thibus has obtained thanks in particular to a training structure that she considers to be “tailor-made” for her. “I am very independent. I choose my training number, the training load. I work according to my needs. And when I’m at Insep, I can do more assaults with the girls, which gives me very good opposition. There is a better adaptation, in my work, between what I do on my side and what I do with the group.
Added to this is a better self-knowledge. Logic at 31, with already 24 years of fencing behind her, who had come to the discipline by chance, to follow her brother to training when she was only 7 years old. “I got to know myself. I know that as soon as there are high stakes and expectations, it can affect me, but knowing that I am well prepared takes the pressure off me. With experience, I also know how to manage my day better by concentrating match after match. I know that the formula may seem a bit boring but it allows me to better concentrate on what I have to do at the moment. I also have more hindsight on my performance, I’m more able to tell myself that it’s only sport and that it can happen to come across stronger than me. That’s the game.”
Finally, the last element of balance in his structure, his work with a mental trainer, Meriem Salmi, and with his companion in life, Race Imboden, American foil fencer and triple silver medalist at the World Championships. “Working with him brings me a lot,” she says. “It is part of my project. He has been on three trips this year. Overall, we do a lot of debriefings of my competitions, we watch videos together, we work a lot on my game, on my preparation itself… ”With the aim of staying on top of the world in particular against her number 1 rival, the American Lee Kiefer, whose fencing she praises. “She has incredible consistency. She is a very good fencer, with a completely different game because she created her own fencing with a totally unique game. So you have to shoot Lee to understand Lee. It’s really interesting and I’m working to beat it.”
After these World Championships in Milan, Ysaora Thibus will then have time to think about Paris 2024, where she dreams of winning the other major title missing from her list: “The Games, I am necessarily thinking about it. When I go to a competition, the idea is to continue to progress and gain confidence for Paris. Even at 31, I feel like I’m still learning. Afterwards, I’m not going to tell you that what I do on a day-to-day basis is already geared towards 2024. There is also the management of the current state of form, the management of small physical glitches, small weaknesses to be eliminated. And at the same time the Games remain the ultimate goal and inevitably they are always in the back of my mind.
