Boubakri, Walczky fail to reach round of 64 as Grand Prix Doha enters final stage

Doha: Tunisia’s Ines Boubakri, the bronze medallist at the 2018 Rio Olympics, and the World No. 30 Julia Walczyk of Poland sensationally failed to make it into the round of 64 at the end of the preliminary rounds of the women’s event of the International Fencing Federation (FIE) Foil Grand Prix Doha 2021 at the Aspire Dome yesterday.

More than 260 fencers from 51 countries are competing for points that help towards qualification for the Tokyo Olympics at the three-day tournament, which ends today. Unlike the men’s event on Friday, the first stage of the qualifying rounds (the pool stage) involved 128 female fencers with the top-16 finishers automatically securing their last-64 tickets, where they joined the world’s top-16 ranked athletes who got the preliminary rounds bye.