Last night I shot the Main Events at the 2009 Duel in the Desert. There was much better lighting but the venue was tiny. My only fast lenses are the venerable Nikkor 50mm f1.8 and the Nikkor 80-200 f2.8. Yikes, even the 50 was too long for the narrow (two or three rows) seating along the strip. Lighting was much better with the entire strip was light by the house can lights --YEAHHHH!!!!!!!!!
I didn't de-noise any of these shots and there is some graininess making an appearance.
Anyway here are my favorites:
Some foil action!
The mens Epee bout was the final event and boy it was a good one that came down to a final touch tie break (or what ever it is called).
The guy in the bow tie in the background is my daughter's coach.
I'm thinking a full frame D3 would have helped a bit with higher ISO (so I could have increased the shutter speed) and it would have removed the crop factor and brought my lenses down in effective focal length.
mbb