James-Andrew Davis is a British fencer, European champion in 2014.
Background
Davis was born and brought up in Barnet, North London. He became interested in fencing at the age of four, while waiting for his mother to pick up his brother for his own sport at a Saturday club and fenced at clubs including RLS Fencing and Finchley Foils.
Career
He competed in men"s foil at the 2012 Summer Olympics. He claimed another bronze medal, this time with the team, at the 2010 Junior European Championships in Lobnya. Beginning preparation for the 2012 Summer Olympics on home ground, in London, Davis was ordered by his coach to lose weight or be dropped from Team Great Britain. Davis shed more than 5 stone (32 kg) in 18 months and his fencing improved accordingly: he climbed from Number.346 at the end of the 2009-2010 season to Number.29 on the eve of the Olympics and was allocated one of Great Britain"s quota places as hosts.
This result, and three quarter-finals in other World Cup events, pushed him into the world Top 16.
At the European Championships in Zagreb he made his way to the semi-finals, where he lost 15–18 to Russia"s Aleksey Cheremisinov, and came away with a bronze medal. In the team event, Britain overcame France in the quarter-finals, but fell 45–42 against Poland.
They defeated Russia 45–33 to earn Davis a second bronze medal. He finished the season Number.7 in world rankings.
At the beginning of the 2013-2014 season Davis went to San Francisco to train at the Massialas Foundation with United States of America national coach Greg Massialas.
Davis was led 10–6 when the referee interrupted the bout: with temperatures above 35 °C (95 °F), his sweat-drenched jacket was registering false positives. Cheremisinov took his revenge in the team event, where Russia disposed of Britain in the quarter-finals. At the World Championships in Kazan reached the quarter-finals, where he was defeated 15–6 by France"s Enzo Lefort.
In the team event, Britain were largely overpowered by Italy in the quarter-finals and finished 8th.
Davis ended up world Number.6, his best ranking so far. Davis studies psychology at Middlesex University.
He is also a fencing coach for Ziemowit Wojciechowski"s fencing club