Melbourne HEMA Open draws 61 fighters across 10 divisions
Melbourne HEMA Open put 61 fighters into 10 divisions, but the HEMA Ratings entry stayed inactive until validation, keeping the rankings ripple provisional.
Sixty-one fighters spread across 10 divisions made the Melbourne HEMA Open look less like a routine club stop and more like an early read on regional form. The HEMA Ratings entry was live, but still marked inactive, so the event’s place in the standings will not harden until the organizer validates the results.
The division mix told the real story. Men’s Steel Single Rapier Masters 50+ had 5 fighters and 5 bouts, while Mixed Steel Longsword Pools stacked up 37 fighters across 96 fights. Mixed Steel Single Rapier Open drew 35 fighters for 123 fights, and Mixed Steel Single Sidesword Open brought in 30 fighters for 90 fights. Tier A and Tier B longsword brackets, plus Tier B rapier and sidesword divisions and underrepresented-genders singles, gave the tournament a wider competitive shape than a simple open bracket ever would.
That structure matters because it spreads opportunity across weapons, ages, and experience bands instead of forcing everyone into one catch-all field. For Australian fencers, and for travelers coming in from nearby scenes, the page already hints at who had to survive the deepest brackets and where the pressure was heaviest. The names attached to the field included Sean Franklin, Gindi Wauchope and Lorne Williams, alongside clubs and groups such as Scholar Victoria, The School of Historical Fencing, Fechtschule Victoria, Adelaide Sword Academy, Melbourne Messer Club, Auckland Longsword, Hanoi HEMA Club and Wayfarers.
HEMA Scorecard listed Melbourne HEMA Open 2026 as an active event in Melbourne, Victoria, on June 6, showing the tournament was still being processed through the results system while HEMA Ratings waited for final confirmation. That is why the page reads as a live bulletin rather than a finished ledger. Until validation lands, any ranking movement remains provisional.
The organizer framed the meet as a three-day public-holiday tournament at Darebin Community Sports Stadium, 857 Plenty Rd, Reservoir VIC 3073, with rapier on June 6, sidesword on June 7 and longsword on June 8. Every fencer was promised at least eight matches, interstate travelers were offered billeting and travel help, interstate tickets were heavily discounted, spectators were free, and loaner longswords, sideswords, rapiers and limited PPE were available. Volunteers were also needed for refereeing and table work, a sign the event was built for scale.
The School of Historical Fencing, founded in 2015 and billed as Melbourne’s largest HEMA club, had the infrastructure to stage it. The Australian Historical Fencing League says its National Leaderboard is the country’s primary ranking system and decides the Australian Historical Fencing Champion, so once the Melbourne results are validated, they will feed straight into the national picture.
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