Once a country exclusively focused on succeeding in foil fencing, a decade-long shift to nurturing talent across all weapons catapulted Japan to a record tally of five medals at the Paris Olympics, including two gold.
Japan's first Olympic fencer, Shinichi Maki, fought in foil at the 1952 Helsinki Games before a fourth-place team finish at the 1964 Tokyo Games motivated domestic youth development to focus on foil for the nearly half-century that followed.
With the torso being the only valid target in foil fencing, the event has been seen as a discipline to which the meticulous approach of Japanese fencers is best suited, and it eventually resulted in Yuki Ota winning individual silver in Beijing in 2008, the country's first medal in the sport, and Japan winning team silver four years later in London.
"Silver at the London Games had been Japan's best result in team foil and no one in our team wavered from the goal of eclipsing that, at any cost," captain Kyosuke Matsuyama said Monday, a day after he and his teammates beat Italy in the final for their historic team foil gold.
The 2012 success was the time the Japan Fencing Federation deemed ripe to break ground and "cast a wider net for epee and sabre as well as female fencers" to beef up its talent pool, according to Japan head coach Yusuke Aoki, a push further accelerated after Tokyo won the bid to host the 2020 games.
Epee and sabre programs were established at the Japanese Olympic Committee's elite academy, specializing in youth development, with junior competitions also set up. It led to youngsters, including current women's sabre ace Misaki Emura, taking up the disciplines exclusively to change the Japanese fencing landscape.
The Japan national team has been drafting in coaches from powerhouse nations such as France in recent years to learn the latest developments in the sport. Training camps abroad with strong nations are now a regular occurrence, helping Japanese athletes become more familiar with their foes.
It was the men's epee team that won Japan's first fencing gold in 2021 in Tokyo. Three years on and Koki Kano won the epee individual gold, joining the foil team in topping the podium.
The men's epee team was unable to defend its Tokyo title but secured silver, while women's foil and sabre teams both claimed bronze.
"Our stomachs knotted when hearing Japan won a fencing medal for the third straight day," joked Takahiro Shikine, who clinched the men's team foil gold. "We managed to overcome the pressure."
By joining artistic gymnastics, judo and skateboarding in winning multiple golds in Paris, fencing raised its profile in Japan immeasurably.
"This is the first step toward fencing becoming a forte for Japan," Matsuyama said after Japan fencers' overall performance this summer. "The important thing is to keep winning."
Related coverage:
Olympics: Japan wins gold in men's fencing team foil event at Paris Games
Olympics: Misaki Emura leads Japan to bronze in women's team sabre
Olympics: Japan wins 1st ever women's team foil medal in Paris
