Vivian Kong

Vivian Kong Man-wai

Kong in 2024 with her Olympic gold medal
Personal information
Nickname	Smiling Queen of Fencing (微笑劍后)[1][2][3]
Born	(1994-02-08) 8 February 1994 (age 30) Hong Kong
Height	1.78 m (5 ft 10 in)
Weight	66 kg (146 lb)
Sport
Sport	Fencing
Rank	1st
Event	Épée
Turned pro	2013
Coached by	Octavian Zidaru
Achievements and titles
Olympic finals	Gold medal in Women's épée (2024)
Highest world ranking	1st (2023)
Medal record Women's épée Representing  Hong Kong Olympic Games 2024 Paris Individual World Championships 2019 Budapest Individual 2022 Cairo Individual Asian Games 2022 Hangzhou Team 2014 Incheon Individual 2014 Incheon Team 2018 Jakarta Individual 2018 Jakarta Team 2022 Hangzhou Individual Asian Championships 2018 Bangkok Individual 2022 Seoul Individual 2023 Wuxi Individual 2017 Hong Kong Individual 2018 Bangkok Team 2022 Seoul Team 2023 Wuxi Team 2011 Seoul Team 2014 Suwon Team 2015 Singapore Team 2016 Wuxi Team 2017 Hong Kong Team 2019 Chiba Team

Vivian Kong Man Wai MH (Chinese: 江旻憓; Jyutping: gong1 man4 wai6; born 8 February 1994) is a Hong Kong left-handed épée fencer. A three-time individual Asian champion and three-time Olympian, she won gold in women's individual épée at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.^[4][5][6]

Kong was born in Hong Kong but lived in Canada between the ages of two and six.^[7] Before taking up fencing, she variously forayed into ballet and taekwondo. She started fencing at the age of eleven and chose épée, stating it "combined the speed of taekwondo and the grace of ballet".^[8]

Kong completed her secondary studies at Sha Tin College and graduated from Stanford University with a Bachelor of Arts in international relations.^[9] She then pursued a Master of Law at Renmin University of China through correspondence while in Hong Kong. As of 2024, she is studying for a Juris Doctor degree at the Faculty of Law at The Chinese University of Hong Kong and aspires to work for the United Nations.^[10] Kong has taken a sabbatical to prepare for the Olympics and had previously declined an offer to represent Canada.^[8]

Kong competed in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games and the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. She became the first fencer from Hong Kong to win a World Cup title when she won the FIE Women's Épée World Cup in Havana, Cuba in January 2019.^[11]

Kong won one of the bronze medals in the women's épée event at the 2022 World Fencing Championships held in Cairo, Egypt.^[12]

In the women's épée event at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, Kong defeated Olena Kryvytska in the quarterfinals and Nelli Differt in the semifinals. In the finals, she overcame a 1–7 deficit against Auriane Mallo to win 13–12, securing Hong Kong's third-ever Olympic gold medal.^[13]

In August 2024, Kong announced on Instagram that she would retire from professional fencing and stated that she looks forward to pursuing a "new career".^[14]

After Kong's Olympic medal win, her master's thesis on the politics of Hong Kong after the 2014 "Occupy Central" protests, 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests and subsequent government crackdowns published at the Renmin University of China garnered controversy.^{[15][16][17][18]} Kong's paper was circulated on LIHKG, an online forum that was popular with pro-democracy protestors.^[15]

In her thesis, titled "Occupy Central and Its Effects on Hong Kong Election Reform", Kong argued that the Chinese Communist Party's "patriots-only" electoral overhaul of Hong Kong, which greatly reduced directly elected seats and vetted all political candidates for their "patriotism", corrected the city's trajectory.^[15] She wrote that "anti-Chinese disrupters" twisted the concept of "one country, two systems" and exploited elections to enter the political system, which resulted in a constitutional crisis.^[15]

According to Kong, the protests revealed that the people of Hong Kong held misconceptions about the "one country, two systems" constitutional principle, which include a tendency to place international human rights covenants over the Hong Kong Basic Law, and an over-emphasis on "two systems".^[15] She was critical of the pro-democracy protests, writing that "Hong Kong's chaos and illegal acts in recent years to pursue so-called genuine universal suffrage had already posed a threat to national security" and that the use of protests to "threaten" or bargain with authorities was because Beijing had compromised on occasions.^[15] Kong dismissed "genuine universal suffrage" in Hong Kong with international standards as a "psuedo-proposition", citing a UN position that it is each country's right to choose how to conduct elections.^[15]

Convenor of the Executive Council Regina Ip dismissed Kong's critics as "fawning puppets" of external powers, whose "rabid attacks" come from those living overseas to evade the legal consequences of undermining national security.^[19]

Kong was a member of The Y. Elites Association, a pro-Beijing youth organization associated with the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party.^[20][16][21]

Following Kong and Cheung Ka Long's gold-medal victories at the 2024 Olympic Games, fencing schools in Hong Kong reported a significant increase in public interest.^[22] This was predominantly driven by parents seeking opportunities for their children, though a portion of enquiries also came from adults.^[23]

Year	Location	Event	Position
2024	Paris, France	Individual Women's Épée	1st[24]

Year	Location	Event	Position
2019	Budapest, Hungary	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[25]
2022	Cairo, Egypt	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[26]

Date	Location	Event	Position
2017-05-26	Bogotá, Colombia	Individual Women's Épée	2nd[27]
2023-01-29	Doha, Qatar	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[28]
2023-05-07	Cali, Colombia	Individual Women's Épée	1st[29]
2024-01-31	Doha, Qatar	Individual Women's Épée	1st[30]

Date	Location	Event	Position
2014-07-02	Leipzig, Germany	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[31]
2016-05-20	Legnano, Italy	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[32]
2018-01-19	Havana, Cuba	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[33]
2018-09-11	Tallinn, Estonia	Individual Women's Épée	2nd[34]
2019-11-01	Havana, Cuba	Individual Women's Épée	1st[35]
2019-08-02	Barcelona, Spain	Individual Women's Épée	1st[36]
2019-05-17	Dubai, United Arab Emirates	Individual Women's Épée	3rd[37]
2022-12-10	Vancouver, Canada	Individual Women's Épée	2nd[38]
2023-05-19	Fujairah, United Arab Emirates	Individual Women's Épée	2nd[39]
2024-02-10	Barcelona, Spain	Individual Women's Épée	1st[40]
2024-05-18	Fujairah, United Arab Emirates	Individual Women's Épée	1st[41]

Year	Location	Event	Position
2011	Seoul, South Korea	Team Women's Épée	3rd
2014	Suwon, South Korea	Team Women's Épée	3rd[42]
2015	Singapore	Team Women's Épée	3rd
2016	Wuxi, China	Team Women's Épée	3rd[43]
2017	Hong Kong, China	Individual Women's Épée	2nd[44]
2017	Hong Kong, China	Team Women's Épée	3rd[45]
2018	Bangkok, Thailand	Individual Women's Épée	1st[46]
2018	Bangkok, Thailand	Team Women's Épée	2nd[47]
2019	Chiba, Japan	Team Women's Épée	3rd[48]
2022	Seoul, South Korea	Individual Women's Épée	1st[49]
2022	Seoul, South Korea	Team Women's Épée	2nd[50]
2023	Wuxi, China	Individual Women's Épée	1st[51]
2023	Wuxi, China	Team Women's Épée	2nd[52]

• Vivian Kong at the International Fencing Federation
• Vivian Kong at Olympics.com
• Vivian Kong at Olympedia