Gold in Burgos, Bronze in Budapest: Team Ukraine's Fencing Weekend Results

Anna Maksymenko fell one touch short of an individual medal.

Team Ukraine won two Cadet-Junior World Fencing Cup medals in a single weekend. At the Burgos stage, the junior women's épée team won gold, and in Budapest, sabre fencer Maiia Velychko won bronze at the Cadet World Cup.

In total, the December 12–14 competition weekend featured three World Cup stages for cadets and juniors. The DeTalks team has gathered all the Ukrainians' results from the tournaments.

Team Ukraine's Cadet-Junior World Cup Results for December 12–14

• Gold in the junior team épée event in Burgos went to reigning world champions Valeriia Bilous-Hridzhak, Emily Konrad, Alina Dmytruk, and Anna Maksymenko.The Ukrainian team was seeded first, and on its way to the final, won three matches by margins of more than 10 touches: over Bulgaria (45:29), Hong Kong (45:26), and Poland (45:34). In the gold-medal match, the 'yellow-and-blue' quartet beat Team USA (45:35), led by individual champion Lea Machulski.
• The individual competition in Spain, meanwhile, didn't go as well for Ukraine: the best result was Anna Maksymenko's fifth place, after she lost by a single touch for a semifinal spot to Estonia's Julia Trinova (14:15). Two more Ukrainians — Konrad and Bilous-Hridzhak — were eliminated in the round of 16.

• At the Cadet World Cup in Budapest, Maiia Velychko won bronze. The athlete won all six of her pool bouts, then beat Sophie Kerekes (15:5), Zou Yuyan (15:11), Julia Doll (15:13), and Yu Kit (15:13) in the playoffs, securing her medal. The sabre fencer lost to Japan's Rika Sasakawa (3:15) in the semifinal. In the older junior competition the next day, Maiia finished 13th, and 14th as part of the team alongside her fellow Ukrainians.

• At the Junior World Cup foil event in Bangkok, Ukraine was represented by Svitlana Bryzghalova. The athlete won three of her six pool bouts, then lost in the round of direct elimination to Kazakhstan's Sofiia Aktaieva (10:15).

2025 Junior World Fencing Cup in Burgos (Team, Épée)

1. Ukraine

2. USA

3. Spain

2025 Cadet World Fencing Cup in Budapest (Sabre)

1. Yang Shuhan (Hong Kong)

2. Rika Sasakawa (Japan)

3. Maiia Velychko (Ukraine)

3. Xu Yiyun (China)

The Cadet-Junior World Cup stages in Spain, Thailand, and Hungary were Ukraine's last of 2025. The next stages of competition will be hosted by Colombia, the UAE, Switzerland, and Italy, starting January 2.

Anna Maksymenko: Full DeTalks Interview

Watch DeTalks' full interview with Anna Maksymenko, the 2025 junior world and European fencing champion, on the project's YouTube channel.