Bhavani Devi is repeatedly coming out of her comfort zone Over the past three months. Fencer Bhavani Devi, who made history at the Tokyo Olympics by becoming the first Indian to compete in the sport at the Games, has won the Charlellville National Competition in France in the individual women's sabre event.
she stood facing off against another fencer at a gymnastics facility in the French city of Orleans. Later that day, she was asked to dangle off parallel bars at the same gymnasium. A couple of days later, she found herself trying her feet at the Colombian dance form of Zumba
The tasks are part of the unique training methods employed by legendary fencing master Christian Bauer, under whom the Indian will train for the Paris Olympics cycle. Having made history at Tokyo 2020 earlier this year by becoming the first Indian fencer to compete at an Olympics, Bhavani has moved her base from Livorno, where she was training under Nicola Zanotti, to Orleans to train at Bauer's academy.
Bauer, a fencing coach who specialises in sabre, is the man behind multiple Olympic medals. At Athens 2004, he guided Aldo Montano to gold in the men's individual sabre event. In Beijing, four years later, he helped the Chinese women's sabre team claim silver and Zhong Man the men's individual gold. In London 2012 and Rio 2016, he was the sabre fencing coach for the Russians, leading them to multiple medals, including those for Yana Egorian and Sofya Velikaya in women's individual sabre event.