Cate Priestley has, almost since the day she took up fencing, gravitated to the sabre — epèe and foil being the other two weapons one can choose. “In saber, nine times out of ten, you want to be on the attack, which I love,” shared the Notre Dame senior. “I don’t have time to hesitate!”

Her attack-minded, always-moving-forward ethos will serve her well in her new role as an EcoAthletes Champion.

“Cate impressed me from the start as someone who wants to use her voice, her platform to make a difference right now in the #ClimateComeback,” offered EcoAthletes founder and CEO Lew Blaustein. “She will do what she can to use her megaphone as a student-athlete — on the Notre Dame campus and beyond — to show her followers how they can attack the climate crisis by taking action.”

Inspired by watching fencing on TV during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the Atlanta native first picked up a saber when she was five years old and has not looked back since.

“I picked up the basics of saber quickly, learning how to parry (block), defend and attack with controlled aggression in order win a bout to five points,” Priestley recalled. “To do so requires fitness, speed, agility, eye-hand coordination, balance, as well as a calm demeanor and focused mentality. Those qualities allow you to absorb the game plan and then course correct when things aren’t going well. When you have all that, it’s as if time slows down during the bout and that’s when winning happens!”

She joined Atlanta’s Nellya Fencing Club, one of the best saber clubs in the country, and had the same coach from the time she was five until she graduated high school.

“Coach Terence Lasker’s nurturing yet competitive style really suited me,” noted Priestley. “That’s a big reason why I looked forward to the four-times-per week practices.”

Those practice sessions certainly paid off — Priestley found herself on the Division I college track as she progressed from the youth ranks to the cadets (under 16s) to the juniors (under 19s).

“I started to think about where I wanted to fence in college when I was a freshman and it built from there,” she recalled. “While I looked at Boston College, I always liked Notre Dame. I wanted to go to medical school — I’m interested in orthopedics and sports medicine — and Notre Dame was and is great at preparing you for that. And the fact that the fencing team is the best in the country was a very good thing.”

As with coach Lasker, Priestley also has had a strong relationship with the Fighting Irish fencing coach Gia Kvaratskhelia.

“Gia treats everyone the same, which is to say amazingly and fairly,” she asserted. “He values every single person on the team whether that be the Olympians or the benchwarmers. This has meant a lot to me because I’m not the best on the squad — I didn’t make the travel team as a freshman, become a starter as a sophomore, but couldn’t compete as a junior because of a lower back injury. Her emphasis on team in what is essentially an individual sport rekindled my love for fencing as I had burned out when I was a junior in high school.”

Healthy now, she is looking forward a strong senior season but knows the competition within the team will be tough. Coach Kvaratskhelia has brought in four very talented saber freshmen on the women’s squad, so making the Irish travel squad, which only is comprised of four to five fencers, will be a challenge. Priestley will take that on the only way she knows how — by going on the attack!

She has taken that same approach when it comes to learning about climate change and then figuring out how to best act on it.  

“I learned about the climate change basics in high school and at Notre Dame, from greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to the methane problem to the climate benefits of a plant-based diet versus a meat-based one,” noted Priestley. “A class during my sophomore year, ‘Hothouse Earth’, really brought it home for me, and was a real ‘aha’ moment. My medical student mind was convinced: Humanity has a carbon problem; we have the tools to solve it. I started asking myself, ‘why are we not acting faster? That has to change!”

Priestley wasn’t sure how to start taking climate action until taking a class this spring with Professor Annie Coleman, ‘Environmental Awareness, Action, and Sports’. It was there that she first heard about EcoAthletes. And now, only a few months later, she is ready to parry and yes, attack the climate crisis through the lens of a student-athlete.

“Being an EcoAthletes Champion is a perfect fit for me,” enthused Priestley. “After all, I get to meet and work with a network of climate-minded and climate-active athletes from all over the world on programs that will make a difference on climate change.”

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