How 18-year-old Juliet Heng became a fencing champion

Photo credit: Fencing Singapore.

Juliet Heng at the 2023 SEA Games in Cambodia.

Juliet Heng trains six days a week, and sometimes has three separate training sessions in a single day. Dedication has paid off for the 18-year-old fencer, who won a gold medal in the Women’s Individual Sabre and a Bronze medal in the Women’s Team Sabre at the SEA Games in Cambodia in May.

Shestruggled to find her form in the early rounds during the SEA Games, and confesses she got a few lucky breaks as she grappled with an old injury. But Juliet found her stride in the semi-final, and defeated fellow Singaporean Jessica Ong in the final to clinch the gold.

"I wanted to come home with a medal, and of course it would be good if it’s a gold medal. I met my own goal, and that affirmed my efforts that I have put into this sport,” she said.

For Juliet, the win was a high point in a sporting journey that began when she was in primary school, and would see her develop as an athlete over many years. It helped that she received support throughout from Singapore’s High Performance Sporting ecosystem.

Photo credit: Fencing Singapore.

Juliet at the 2023 SEA Games in Cambodia.

‘The last sport I ever thought about’

Juliet first took up fencing in the Junior Sports Academy (JSA) programme, which gives primary school students with promising physical skills the opportunity to learn and participate in a variety of sports, while discovering their sporting strengths and interests.

Italmost didn’t happen. After initially being knocked back for the programme, she scraped in from the waitlist after someone else decided not to attend. But this turn of events would have a huge impact on her future.

Through her experience at JSA she learned to love the sport and gained a great foundation to improve her skills.

"The coaches there saw that I was having fun, and that I was doing relatively well for my age, so they asked me if I would like to join the Learn-to-Fence programme on weekends,” she said.

From there, she joined Singapore Sports School’s fencing academy, and eventually qualified for the Asian & World Cadets and Juniors Fencing Championships in 2021. She was youth-carded in 2022, placing her on the high-performance pathway as a junior athlete. She made it to the Top 32 at the 2022 World Fencing Championships.

Levelling up through spexScholarship

This year, she qualified for a Sports Excellence Scholarship (spexScholarship), which provides additional support for elite athletes. This includes financial and programmatic support to prepare them for major events at a regional and global level.

The spexScholarship also helps athletes balance work and study with their sometimes-gruelling training regimens. Juilet still manages a grade point average of 3.55 out of 4 at Ngee Ann Polytechnic Sports School Diploma Programme, where she is enrolled in Business Studies.

For Juliet, the scholarship is helpful because it gives her access to a sports psychologist and a nutritionist. But perhaps more importantly, it also gives her the financial ability to attend more competitions, particularly in Europe, which hosts the most important competitions.

Photo credit: Fencing Singapore.

Juliet at the World Junior and Cadet Fencing Championships 2023.

Olympic dreams

Despiteher recent win, Juliet remains humble, insisting she prefers to focus on the next competition instead of the milestones that are further away. Nevertheless, she does have one crowning ambition for her fencing career.

"It's just to represent Singapore at the Olympics. I’ll keep looking forward to it,” she says.

Read more about Singapore High Performance Sports ecosystem here.