BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.3.6//EN BEGIN:VEVENT UID:19@wessexleague.org DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20251122T090000 DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20251123T180000 DTSTAMP:20251115T131406Z URL:https://wessexleague.org/events/wessex-league-2025-oxford-radley/ SUMMARY:Wessex League 2025 - Oxford Radley DESCRIPTION:\n This year at Wessex we will be ensuring parity in Open and Women's+ tournaments - if we run an Open\, we will run a Women's+ in the s ame weapon. As a result we are no longer running beginners tournaments and there have been major schedule changes from previous years that will affe ct both Opens and Women's+ events. We have also made some small changes to sword rules to codify decisions made last year and have further changes p lanned in 2026 so please read the below carefully even if you have been to Wessex League before. \n\nWe have had to be creative with the schedule t o allow for a full set of 8 events\, half of which also have A/B skill div isions. Many W+ events run at the same time as an open - this is unfortuna tely unavoidable. Please do not enter tournaments that run at the same tim e. The exception for this is Women's+ Sabre - you may enter this and eithe r Open Sword &\; Buckler or Rapier &\; Dagger but not both. We will try to avoid clashes by running a round of pools overlapping each open tou rnament and place you accordingly. If this is not possible with the number of participants\, we will contact you to discuss which you prefer and ref und you for the other tournament.\n\nSkill Divisions\nWe aim to run skill divisions whenever the number of participants and schedule allows. For thi s event that will be Open Longsword and Open Sabre. Participants will be d ivided into each tournament based upon their HEMA Rating shortly before th e event. Those without a public HEMA rating will be placed to the best of our abilities.  Simply sign up for the tournament and you will later be p laced in the appropriate event.  In future events\, medalists from earlie r league events this year will also be placed into the the A division rega rdless of rating. The league points for A and B are the same\, but you can not win a league medal if you have not reached a quarter final in the A di vision for the weapon or an undivisioned tournament. Anyone with enough po ints to be considered for a medal will be placed in A for the final event. \n\nWe will be running  the following competitions:\n\n Open Longsword ( A &\; B)\n Open Rapier &\; Dagger (No division)\n Open Sabre (A &a mp\; B)\n Open Sword &\; Buckler (No division)\n Women's+ Longsword ( No Division)\n Women's+ Rapier &\; Dagger (No division)\n Women's + S word &\; Buckler (No Division)\n Women's + Sabre (No Division)\n\nIf y ou miss out on tickets for a particular tournament there is a waiting list which we will offer tickets to as and when they drop out. We recommend re gistering for any other tournaments you are interested in\, and then filli ng out the waiting list form here.\n\nSchedule\n\nPlease note that to acco mmodate the changes all finals for every tournament on the day will be at run at the end\n\n\n\n \;\nVenue &\; Travel:\nRadley College\,\nKen nington Rd\, \n\nRadley\, \n\nAbingdon \n\nOX14 2HR\nSocials\nFriday socia l: TBA\nSaturday social: TBA\n\nMeals and refreshments:\nWe recommend brin ging food with you. Budgens in Abingdon is 1.6 miles away\, Sainsburys tow ards Oxford is 3 miles away.\n\nPizza\, tea\, coffee and biscuits will be provided for staff only. Anyone staffing at any point over the weekend may help themselves at any time.\nRules &\; Equipment\nPlease be sure to r ead the tournament rules and minimum required equipment requirements. It i s your responsibility to make sure you have the correct equipment for the event - if you do not have sufficient or appropriate equipment you will no t be allowed to fence in the tournament. If you are missing particular ite ms please contact us and we may be able to arrange something to be borrowe d.\n\nSword Changes\n\nThe following rules codify how Wessex League the "v ibes based" sword check run prior to 2024\, or make changes that either in crease permitted swords or do not block swords used last year. Almost all swords that passed checks last year will pass this year\, although some sw ords may need to be tipped that weren't previously. These rules will be ch anging from 2026 to further reduce swords that are too stiff.  We are giv ing a year grace period to allow people to acquire new swords if necessary .\n\nMaximum flex on swords (measured by pushing the sword into a scale fr om the crossguard and taking the maximum reading):\nLongsword: 20kg (16kg in from 2026)\nSabre and Sword &\; Buckler: 14kg\nRapier: 12kg\n\nTip A rea\nNo sword may have a tip area below 75mm2 (9mm bullet case\, Sigi Stan dard Longsword)\, with a preferred tip size over 120mm2 (greater than .323 bullet case\, or Regenyei Standard rolled tip). Swords with plastic tips may be up to 1cm longer than the normal allowed sword length maximum to al low for the extra material in the tip.\n\nNote: please check your sword be fore coming\, in particular sabres\, sideswords and arming swords as many of these have smaller tips. Many smaller tips (e.g. heat shrink end caps) can also come below this minimum. We will have tipping supplies present bu t you must tip your sword at least 45 minutes before you are fencing to al low the plastic to set. PCL thermoplastic (recommended brand: Whitemorph o r Colourmorph by Thermoworx) remains our preferred method for tipping\, se e this article for best practice on tipping: https://historicalfencingrese arch.com/2025/06/13/common-thermoplastic-tip-failures-and-how-to-avoid-the m/\n\nSword Length\nSwords for Sword &\; Buckler may be up to 95cm in l ength. This reflects the changes in the market since the rules were first written as many sidesword providers do not offer swords within our origina l permitted lengths.\n\nSword Mass:\nThe maximum mass for longsword is red uced to 1700g\nThe minimum mass for sabre is reduced to 750g\n\nWomen's+ T ournament Entries\nThe women’s category in HEMA tournaments was original ly created to provide meaningful challenges for women. The ultimate aim of providing them has been to: allow fencers to test their skills in a situa tion without routine physical disadvantages\; understand their progress re lative to their peers year on year\; give greater access to tournaments to an under-represented gender in our sport\; ensure people realise that the ir gender does not prevent them from participating in HEMA.\n\nWhile the p rimary intent in the past has been to support women\, we recognise that ma ny of considerations above apply equally to many non-binary fencers as wel l. Therefore\, this tournament is open to:\n  a) Women (for the avoidance of doubt: cis or trans)\n  b) Any non-binary fencers who feel the issues above also apply to them\, and that their presence in the tournament woul dn’t detract from the aims in regards to women\n\nWe recognise that ther e are a wide range of non-binary genders\, and not all of them will feel c omfortable participating in the women’s tournament. It is entirely up to the fencer in question whether they think the Women's+ is suitable for th em. The Open tournaments are all open to any gender. \nVolunteering:\nIf you would like to volunteer but haven't signed up\, there may still be opp ortunities depending on how many volunteers we have. Please fill out the V olunteering details below and email at wessexleague@gmail.com so that we c an apply the discount after the fact.\n\n Competitors who would like to h elp us as volunteers receive a free lunch and a discount on your ticket \ n This year we are offering one free tournament entry for volunteers\n V olunteers also get early booking for each event\n If you have received a volunteer code\, please use it at checkout\n ONLY volunteering as an offi cial\, without participating in any tournaments – FREE of charge. We w ill pay up to £75 towards your travel costs and will provide lunch on a d ay of volunteering.\n\nCost to attend: \n• ONLY volunteering as an of ficial\, without participating in any tournaments – FREE of charge.\n\ n £35 per open competition entry\n £30 Women's+ tournaments\n\nDisclai mer: By registering you agree to the following statement:\n\n“I understa nd that whilst every care will be taken to give safe instruction\, I accep t full responsibility and consider myself fit to participate\, and that th ere are inherent risks with competitive martial arts. I will follow instru ctions by judging staff and tournament organisers\, be respectful of my fe llow competitors\, and use equipment in good condition with no known flaws . I have answered all questions correctly and all medical and health consi derations are noted below.”\n\nHow we use your data: Your will be used p rimarily for managing our events\, and for research into safety at HEMA to urnaments.  By registering you agree to share the data from your matches with HEMA Ratings and HEMA Scorecard\,. We cannot accept your registration if you do not agree to this as these are necessary to run the event. Your results will also be posted on our website. We record injury data as part of understanding and managing risk across our events. Anonymised data (in cluding injury data) may be shared with researchers for specific projects\ , but we will not share your name or other details\, and your data will ne ver be used for marketing purposes outside of informing you of our own eve nts. For a more detailed description see our privacy page.\n\nIf you don't want to appear in HEMA Ratings\, you can contact HEMA Ratings directly an d ask for your record to be anonymised. Your data will still be submitted\ , but it will not appear in any public page. If your HEMA rating is anonym ised\, please email us about whether you feel Tier A or Tier B is more app ropriate for you in any of the tournaments you have registered for.\nIf a tournament doesn't appear in the list below it means it is sold out. If yo u missed out on a tournament please sign up to the waiting list by clickin g here. If anyone drops out we will contact you. 2 weeks after booking ope ns we will be reviewing W+ spaces and may expand opens if there are free p istes. LOCATION:Radley College\, Kennington Road\, Radley\, OX14 2HR\, United King dom X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=Kennington Road\, Radley\, OX14 2HR\, United Kingdom;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=Radley College:geo:0, 0 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/London X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/London BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20251026T010000 TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0000 TZNAME:GMT END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR