My friend Caryl Oliver’s huge contribution to fencing spanned more than five decades, several continents and almost every aspect of the sport. Caryl, who has died aged 73 of cancer, believed passionately in the ability of fencing to bring people together.
She first picked up a foil at the age of 12 (women and girls were only allowed to wield the lightweight weapon in those days), having been told she was too old to train as an Olympic swimmer, and fencing instantly became her passion.
Caryl was born in Stockholm, to Paula and Raye Oliver, her father’s job as a marketing director for an international firm having taken the family to Sweden. Back in London she was educated at the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle, where she became fluent in French.
By the early 1970s she was part of the Great Britain squad preparing for the 1976 Montreal Olympics, though eventually she missed out on selection by one place. Her reaction to this disappointment was typically radical: she left for Australia, initially thinking that fencing was no longer for her. That lasted just three months before she was asking for her kit to be sent to her new home in Sydney.
Her prowess as an organiser came to the fore there.
