Exclusive: Egyptian fencer Mohamed Elsayed on his a viral Olympic celebration and meeting Mohamed Salah

How would you react if you won an Olympic medal? The answer is probably similar to what Mohamed Elsayed did at Paris 2024.

The Egyptian fencer secured the men’s épée bronze medal, Egypt’s first medal of the Games and first in fencing for 12 years, in the most dramatic of circumstances.

His bronze medal contest against Hungarian Tibor Andrasfi was evenly poised under the bright, burning lights of the Grand Palais, seven points apiece, into sudden death overtime, with a medal on the line. The next legal hit would win it.

“When we do a priority in fencing, it's a golden touch, so when you do it, it usually comes the first time,” Elsayed tells Olympics.com, “but in the Olympic Games, we repeated this touch seven times. In fencing this is insane, it's impossible.”

The 22-year-old feels the hairs stand up on his back when recalling the emotions of that Parisian evening, yet in the moment, he found himself totally composed.

“During that moment, I was very calm, very peaceful,” he reveals. “Mentally, I was like 'There's no noise here'. As you said, the Grand Palais was full of people, and after every touch, it's very noisy. But for me, inside here, it is very calm. When I watch it, I tell you, my heartbeat goes very high.”

That all changed when the now world épée number one secured the winning point, with 1.5 seconds remaining on the clock.

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