There aren't many people who have fond memories of the earthquake that struck Northridge, Calif., back in January 1994. There are even fewer who remember the quake, which hit 6.6 on the Richter scale, as one of the high points in their lives.

But the natural disaster may have actually changed then-12-year-old Derek Snyder's life for the better.

Snyder's Chatsworth home, located just three miles from the quake's epicenter, was shaken off of its foundation and sustained severe structural damage. When the ground finally stopped moving, there was plenty of repair work to be done. The following summer, Snyder's parents, Don and Pam, told their son he had to stay away from the house for awhile.

"They wanted to keep me out of their hair," says Snyder, now a 17-year-old senior at Chaminade College Prep (West Hills, Calif.). "They said I had to take two classes and stay busy. I randomly chose guitar and fencing.

"I ended up dropping guitar when I liked fencing and realized that I had a real knack for it," he adds with a laugh. "It was pretty much a complete accident."

The fencing class Snyder took at Chaminade

	Derek Snyder has won national and international championships after only five years in fencing.

that summer has irreparably altered his path in life. But there has been no mistaking the success that the 5-foot-11, 153-pound prodigy has enjoyed in the sport since taking it up full-time at Chaminade, under the direction of the Rev. Lawrence Calhoun.

"[Derek is] one of those people who's been blessed with natural athletic ability," says Calhoun. "Once he puts his mind to something, he can do it and do it well, no matter what it is. He's got those natural instincts that would go well in any sport and he's got just an innate sense of timing."

Snyder, who has traveled extensively throughout the United States and the world - Hungary, Italy and Japan, among others - for competitions, has utilized those skills to capture the California high school individual state foil championship each of the last three years. The Chaminade team has also been Southern California High School Fencing League champion and state champion each year since Snyder's arrival at the school.

"Derek certainly has become an incredible fencer," says Greg Schiller, the guiding force behind the blossoming fencing program at James Monroe High (North Hills). "He's very impressive to watch on the strip. I just always wished he was on my team."

Snyder, who includes Stanford, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, UPenn and Penn State on his short list of college choices, has added a trio of national titles to his resume during his high school career.

The teen sensation, who was a dedicated and talented soccer player for 11 years before stumbling upon fencing, won the youth (under-15) foil crown at the U.S. Fencing Association Summer National Championships in Plano, Texas, in the summer of 1998. He captured the cadet (under-17) foil title a year ago in North Carolina. And he was the Division I-A men's open foil champion at the national championships, held in Austin, Texas, this past July.

Immediately following his triumph at the Summer National Championships in 1998, Snyder won his only international fencing medal, thus far, in epee, at the World Youth Games in Moscow when his American squad took silver.

"If I had to stop fencing tomorrow because of some kind of an injury, knock on wood, I would definitely feel satisfied knowing that I had spent my time wisely," says Snyder.

"When I started, I had no idea that fencing was as big as it is," he adds. "I thought it would be fun and something that I would do for the summer. ... But I never thought it would be such a big part of my life."