George Masin has stepped down as the Division Chair (most current term, 2007-2010) - and while we're sad to see him go, he's definitely earned his retirement! George's distinguished career, both competitively and in promoting fencing locally and nationally, sets the gold standard. George fenced twice in the Olympics (1972 and '76) and was the Men's Epee champion at the 1971 national championships. George has been a member of the USFA Board of Directors since 1970, and among many other achievements, devised the currently used national points system and introduced Division II and III competition tiers. He served as a Competition Manager at the 1996 Olympic Games. Right: George's official Olympic team photo

Competitive Results:

• 1967 NCAA Men's Epee Champion
• 1971 Heidenheim Epee World Cup, 3rd Place
• 1971 Pan American Games Gold Medal, Men's Epee Team
• 1972 U.S. Olympic Team
• 1976 U.S. Men's Epee Champion
• 1976 U.S. Olympic Team
• 1986 Inducted into NYU Sports Hall of Fame
• 1987 Pan American Games Silver Medal, Men's Epee Team
• 1987 Montreal Epee World Cup, 6th Place
• 1997 Sydney Epee World Cup, 3rd Place
• 2002 Inducted into USFA Hall of Fame
• 12 times Gold Medalist in U.S. Men's Epee Team Championships
• 5 times a member of U.S. World Championship Team

National influence:

In 1973, he proposed a comprehensive point system for the selection of members of U.S. international fencing teams. Since its adoption, all U.S. international fencing team members have been selected via objective criteria. The last team member to be selected via subjective criteria was for the 1972 Olympic Games. Largely as a result of this effort, the USFA created the position of Athlete Representative, a non-voting member of the USFA committee that develops the criteria for international team selection. Masin was selected as the first Athlete Representitive.

He has also been responsible for several important changes as to how fencers are seeded into competitions. For example, he proposed and established the criteria for the awarding of "D" and "E" classifications, and proposed the system by which classifications are slowly lost if not re-earned by appending the year of achievement to the classification letter.

He proposed the establishment of the first national-level competitions restricted by classification, now known as Division II and Division III competitions.

When women first began competing in sabre, he developed the criteria used to decide when women's sabre would be awarded Division I National Championship status. The criteria were submitted by the Women's Sabre Committee to the Board of Directors, adopted, and resulted in the establishment of the Women's Sabre Division I National Championships by unanimous vote when the criteria were met.

The above information has been shamelessly cribbed from Wikipedia's extensive article on George... please inform the webmaster at of any errata or key omissions.

On April 30, 2011 George Masin was inducted into the New York Athletic Club Hall of Fame. The event was attended by more than 500 NYAC members to honor George and his many accomplishments. Notably, George is one of very few fencers to be be honored by the NYAC. Congratulations, George!