SYDNEY — It wasn't an obvious future for a 14-year-old kid in Harlem to choose. But Akhnaten Spencer-El's friends were getting into trouble, and his mother was getting worried.
She was worried enough, in fact, to sign him up in a keep-them-out-of trouble program for inner city children.
A fencing program.
"In my neighborhood, my friends thought it was really stupid, with the tight white suits," he said. "I lost a lot of friends because of fencing."
But he gained a calling.
Spencer-El, who at age 21 has become one of the top fencers in the world, is now representing the United States in his first Olympics.
Unfortunately, a bad case of the nerves spoiled his Olympic debut.
Though the highest-ranked male junior fencer the United States has ever produced, at one time rating No. 1 in the world, Spencer-El lost in his first-round match in the sabre competition.
"I had a tough bout in the beginning," he said. "I froze up."
As usual, most of the fencing golds in Sydney were reserved for the Europeans. Russia and Italy both won three golds, and the other four were shared by France, Hungary, Romania and South Korea.
Still, the United States — aggressive and young — is up there, if not yet at the top.
The women's foil team of Ann Marsh, of Rochester, N.Y., and sisters Iris and Felicia Zimmerman, also of Rochester, nearly won bronze, losing 45-42 to Germany.
In keeping with the sport's somewhat elitist image, the U.S. team has an impressive resume.
The Zimmerman sisters, ranked 13th and 20th in the world, are both students at Stanford. Marsh, ranked 39th, is a practicing doctor. Tamir Bloom, who is ranked 59th in the world, is in his final year of med school at Mount Sinai and plans to be an orthopedic surgeon.
But the future of U.S. fencing may be in the inner city.
Spencer-El is one of three fencers on the team who train with a non-profit organization created by Peter Westbrook, the 1984 Olympic bronze medalist in the sabre, to help inner city kids focus their energies on positive goals.
Westbrook grew up in the projects of Newark, N.J., and used fencing as a way to get out. He is a six-time member of the U.S. Olympic team, a finalist in the 1989 World Championships and won 13 national individual titles.
His foundation, created nine years ago, is now one of the United States' premier training centers. Of the nine members on the Olympic team here, one-third are Westbrook proteges. The other two are Keeth and Erinn Smart, a brother and sister team from Brooklyn, N.Y., who are ranked 58th and 75th in the world.
"A lot of my old friends are in jail, a lot of them are doing drugs," Spencer-El said. "I was fortunate to get out of that environment."
One of fencing's main problems, he said, was the lack of exposure it gets in America.
"You never see it on TV. You only see football and basketball, so that's what everybody wants to do. I'd never seen fencing until I saw it at the foundation."
But he said the appeal of the sport is strong.
"It's kind of like fighting," he said. "When I was growing up I fought a lot, and I like to bring that same mentality into fencing. You can lose one day and come back to win another day."
Spencer-El, who is ranked 62nd in the world as an adult, said his goal after the Olympics is to continue training, get into college and to try to get other people interested in the sport.
Toward that end, he just did a commercial for IBM.
"It's about the fencer from Harlem," he said. "That's me."