Yukon knights are swinging swords with the best of them.
Eight members of Yukon’s Company of the White Wolf are currently competing at the International Medieval Combat Federation’s World Championships in Montemor-o-Velho, Portugal.
Seven are on Canada’s first-ever national team at the championship that began yesterday and runs to Sunday.
The group got there with the help of a GoFundMe campaign that saw $3,105 donated for the trip.
“It’s been a long journey with a lot of preparation to get here but we have done all we can. Thanks for everyone’s generous support, it really means a lot to us and is going to make this trip a lot easier,” Land Pearson, president of the Yukon Medieval Combat Group, posted on Facebook.
Pearson is there to represent Canada in sword and shield duels and five-on-five melees; brother Lake Pearson longsword and melees; Cody Richards polearm duels and melees, and Shauna Heasley women’s polearms duels.
Lance Gadsby, John Hanuluk and Dale Braga will fight in melees.
Mayo’s Jose Amoedeo will represent his native Spain in polearms duels and melees.
The Company of the White Wolf (CWW) won eight medals at the fifth annual Medieval Combat Arts Tournament in Montreal this past February - their first tournament outside the territory. Land defeated his older sibling Lake for gold in the men’s sword and shield, in which both competitors are armed with a short one-handed sword and a shield.
Heasley fought to the most medals for CWW in Montreal with three bronze and a silver.
The CWW is a relatively new outfit. The company, along with the sport’s governing body, the Yukon Medieval Combat Group , stemmed from a presentation at the 2014 Yukomicon - Yukon’s first comic book convention. At Yukomicon Amoedeo, who has previously represented Spain at the world championships, gave a presentation on the sport and it all snowballed from there.
“That’s where our club grew from,” said Land in an interview in February. “He gave his presentation and a few of us followed him around like puppies the rest of the day to hear more about it and it just sprang up from there.
“Most of us didn’t start getting armour until last summer. So it’s been around for a year and a half, but really only getting into armour the last six or eight months.”
Thursday’s world championship results were not available at press time.
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com