Kenta Chida

Kenta Chida
Personal information
Country represented	Japan
Born	(1985-08-22) 22 August 1985 Kesennuma, Miyagi, Japan
Weapon(s)	foil
Hand	left-handed
Height	1.7 m (5 ft 7 in)
Weight	65 kg (143 lb)
National coach(es)	Oleg Matseichuk
Club	Nexus Fencing Team
FIE Ranking	current ranking
Medal record Olympic Games 2012 London Team World Championships 2010 Paris Team Asian Fencing Championships 2011 Seoul Individual 2005 Kota Kinabalu Team 2014 Suwon Individual

Kenta Chida (千田健太, Chida Kenta, born 2 August 1985) is a Japanese fencer.^[1] At the 2012 Summer Olympics he competed in the men's foil, but was defeated in the second round. He won a silver medal in the team foil event.^[2]

Career

Chida's father Kenichi was selected for the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, but he could not attend the event due to Japan's boycott of the Games.^[3] He however made no attempt to push his son into fencing; Kenta chose the sport for himself during his first year at junior high school.^[3] He was originally right handed, but his father suggested that he switch to fencing with his left hand to gain a competitive advantage.^[4]

Chida began fencing in the senior category in the 2002–03 season, then joined the national team and began training under national coach Oleg Matseichuk. Chida made his breakthrough in 2006–07 season: he climbed his first World Cup podium with a bronze medal in the Tokyo World Cup, followed by another bronze in the Cairo Grand Prix.^[3] These results allowed him to enter the Top 20.

At the 2008 Summer Olympics, he competed in the men's individual foil, finishing 11th, losing to Benjamin Kleibrink, the eventual champion, in the second round.^[5]

Chida graduated in 2009 from the Faculty of Letters of Chuo University.

References