Úrsula Selle was the daughter of a German banker and merchant who had emigrated to Venezuela where he ran a business selling bicycles. Although Selle was taken to watch cycling races, her father insisted it was not a sport for women and thus she took up fencing instead. Along with compatriot Gerda Muller the pair were the first women to represent Venezuela at the Olympics when they competed in the foil at the 1952 Helsinki Games. Selle won two of her six bouts in her pool to finish sixth with the top-four fencers progressing to the quarter-finals. After the Olympics she won an individual gold in the foil event at the 1954 Central American and Caribbean Games in Mexico. Selle was later inducted into the Venezuelan Sports Hall of Fame.
Venezuela