Thank you to everyone who attended LIGHTSPEED ATTACK, our 2025 national championship! Let's take a look at the events of Day 3, including the new naming of Lightspeed Saber League’s national champion, women’s champion, and weapon masters.
REY EXCLUSIVE DIV. I
The bracket was close with this year’s Rey Division I. Many matches came to only a few points difference, either starting unbalanced until the eleventh hour or staying close the whole match and truly coming down to the final seconds. José Ortiz-Miranda had some very close matches early in the game; his first against Chicco Smith was tied 12-12 at halftime before Ortiz-Miranda eventually took the match at 23-21 with a post defense, bringing his score up from 18-21. Ortiz-Miranda’s fight with David Lazenby was similarly close. Ortiz-Miranda ended with a two-point lead after climbing up from a 22-22 tie in the last seconds of the match. Energy was intense. Lazenby, who would go on to fight for bronze, said: “Everyone is great fighters and the bracket couldn't have been more balanced. This has been the most insane tournament I've ever been a part of.”
Leo Isales, who recently won a silver medal at the Academy’s May tournament, had a bye into the brackets, first fencing Tony Zaldua who had come on top of his earlier match against Will Alonzo with two defensives. By halftime, Zaldua was up 12-0, but Isales switched his tactics after the break, attacking less explosively and avoiding the first-contact headshots that Zaldua had been collecting earlier in the match. By the end of the match it was Isales’ lead by a single point, ending at 17-16.
Isales moved forward against Ryan McKenna, both of them playing it carefully in the match and feeling out a moment to strike. The match started slowly, at first only up to 0-3 in McKenna’s favor contributed to by a priority call. After coaching, we saw more movement, with Isales quickly landing a defensive to bring him up on the board. After this early win, Isales’ new initiative seemed to play into McKenna’s strengths, who started getting hits in during Isales’ entries. Isales got a good headshot in right before the buzzer, but not enough to make up the new distance, ending the match with McKenna’s win at 21-13.
As McKenna and Ortiz-Miranda moved to gold, Lazenby and Isales entered the box for the fight for bronze. Lazenby held an eight point lead late into the match, until 30 seconds out when Isales got a run of clean hits in, bringing them closer together as the clock ran down. A final clean hit gave Lazenby the win as time ran out, ending the match with Lazenby taking bronze at 32-30.
With bronze decided, the last match of the Rey Division I. tournament began, with Ortiz-Miranda and McKenna fighting for the national champion title. McKenna started the match with a twelve-point lead at 18-6, leaping back out of range of a number of Ortiz-Miranda’s attacks. Down 22-6, Ortiz Miranda shot his score back up with deeper attacks and headshots, bringing the score to 26-22 with McKenna still ahead. In the last moments of the match, a power penalty against Ortiz-Miranda widened McKenna’s lead, who then also scored the last hits of the match, taking gold and the national champion title at 31-23.
Last year’s champion Chris Isom delivered the gold medal to 2025’s national champion Ryan McKenna. McKenna and Isom had fought for gold and silver at Lightspeed Menace in 2024, with McKenna taking silver. After coming back this year to win gold, McKenna was humble about the achievement, emphasizing, “I was just here to enjoy every fight, and it happened to work out.” That it did. Congratulations, Ryan!
Gold: Ryan McKenna
Silver: Jose Ortiz-Miranda
Bronze: David Lazenby
YOUNGLING AND CADET
The Rey Division I bracket was followed by a small Youngling and Cadet tournament, with Lightspeed Academy’s Younglings Moira D. and Liem P., and Cadet Lucas P. competing.
Younglings Moiraa and Liem first competed in the cadet tournament, where Liem ended up in the fight for gold with Lucas in a brother vs. brother match. Lucas’ strong deflections knocked a lot of his brother’s attacks away, and he took the match with clean hits and headshots, making the final score 12-1.
The youngling tournament between Liem and Moira followed. Liem pulled ahead in the beginning with a defensive against Moira, employing an attack that was successful in the earlier pools as well. Moira got her own hits in but Liem kept his advantage and ended the match with a clean hit, taking gold with a final score of 14-4.
Cadet:
Gold: Lucas P.
Silver: Liem P.
Bronze: Moira D.
Youngling:
Gold: Liem P.
Silver: Moira D.
MIXED WEAPON DIV. I
David Lazenby (Ren), who had taken first in the Mixed Weapon pools, was paired with Kevin Degnan (Rey) in his first match of Div. I. Degnan entered Mixed Weapon with automatic qualification from his Rey rank, and took the match 8-16 against Lazenby, getting around his crossguards with hand and body hits, and moving forward against Ortiz-Miranda (Tano). Ortiz-Miranda had previously tossed one of his Tano blades aside to finish his previous match with Chicco Smith, but returned with both for the remainder of the tournament. With three defensives against Degnan, Ortiz-Miranda moved forward 16:8 to the gold and silver match.
Opposite of Degnan and Ortiz-Miranda were Chris Isom (Ren) and Ryan McKenna (Tano). Isom and McKenna had won their previous matches against Phoebe Camilletti (Rey) and Tony Zaldua (Tano) by two and three points, respectively. Isom and McKenna had a close match, breaking for time with only 0-1 on the scoreboard. With four seconds left they had tied at 4-4, Isom just squeezing in an indirect as time ran out making the match 5-4.
That left Degnan and McKenna in the fight for bronze. McKenna pulled ahead with an initial lead, but Degnan recovered after their break, bringing the match to 17-16 (McKenna ahead) after a clean hit with fourteen seconds on the clock. Another clean brought Degnan a single point ahead, at 17-19. Two seconds remained of the match, but that was all the time McKenna needed to snag two indirects, bringing them tied at 19-19 and moving them into sudden death. McKenna took the match with a block and counterattack, scoring five points and winning bronze at 24-19.
Ortiz-Miranda and Isom returned to the box for their gold medal match, reminiscent of Thursday’s Ren Exclusive finale where the two fought for gold. With only a few points scored by either fencer in the first minute of the match, a defensive followed by a clean hit from Ortiz-Miranda in the second half seemed to give him a solid advantage, putting him ahead 12-3. Instead, a leaping defensive from Isom quickly evened them out again, leading to 12-12. The two fencers started to circle each other in the last seconds of the match, looking for an opening, before Isom landed an indirect as time ran out, giving him the gold medal.
McKenna received an E grade in Tano, Ortiz-Miranda a D in Tano, and Isom a C in Ren for their wins.
Gold: Chris Isom
Silver: José Ortiz-Miranda
Bronze: Ryan McKenna
MIXED WEAPON DIV. II
With Division I. completed, the Mixed Weapon Division II. fencers took to their boxes. Silver and bronze Women’s Mixed Weapon medalists Ally Fournier (Rey) and Em Watson (Tano) had their rematch in the bracket, keeping a close fight until a possible defensive almost ended the match before being thrown out by the fencers. Watson eventually won the match 16-4, moving her up against Will Alonzo (Tano) and eventually up to the finals.
Lightspeed Academy member Phil Cucci made an impact in Div II, fighting with Ren. Cucci, who is fairly new to Lightspeed, had only ever competed in one tournament before Nationals and had never used a Ren saber before. He did extremely well in his boxes, beating Nate Maniscalco (Rey) and Jacob Areias (Tano) who had come in second in the Mixed Weapon pools. Cucci was later defeated by Preston Pomeroy (Ren), which sent him against Alonzo for bronze as Pomeroy moved on to the gold/silver match.
Cucci and Alonzo got a rematch of their original Mixed Weapon pools box, fighting for the bronze medal with Ren against Tano. Cucci held his own against Alonzo, gaining a slight lead before a defensive evened them back out. Two more defensives from Alonzo put him ahead 19-13. Unfortunately, power violations from Alonzo took him out of the match, disqualifying him from the fight at 19-21 and awarding Cucci his first medal.
Pomeroy and Watson competed for gold, fighting to 24 points with three minutes on the clock. Pomeroy is well known at Lightspeed Academy for his use of the Ren saber and his skill with small manipulations of the crossguards for blocking, but he still had a hard time getting around both of Watson’s Tano blades, her signature weapons. With the match fairly close before the break, Watson resumed the fight with larger attacks, slipping past some of Pomeroy’s defenses with both sabers moving in a quick assault. A later match defensive from Watson widened her lead to 17-8. The match ended 21-9 to thunderous applause for the display of skill, finesse, and sportsmanship from both fencers. Over the course of the match, Pomeroy gave seven honor calls, confirming hits Watson had landed against him, including a contested defensive, and downgrading excess points awarded for his own attacks.
Gold: Em Watson
Silver: Preston Pomeroy
Bronze: Phil Cucci
WEAPON MASTER
Last year’s Weapon Master José Ortiz-Miranda defended his title, winning Weapon Master for the second year with only a few points above runner-ups Chris Isom and Ryan McKenna. Lightspeed’s first Women’s Weapon Master title was awarded to Em Watson, who took the medal ahead of runner-up Ally Fournier.
Men’s Weapon Master: José Ortiz-Miranda
Runner Up: Chris Isom
Women’s Weapon Master: Em Watson
Runner Up: Ally Fournier
Congratulations to all of the fencers who competed, and to our new national champions! We look forward to seeing you all next year!
Samantha Kolasa
Lightspeed Interim Reporter