was the last entry really about enthused?
Nov. 6th, 2009 08:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zebeeLife has been off and on again for a bit. I'm not a journaling type I suppose
I did find when playing about with English longsword that it really doesn't suit me compared to the Italian. I could do the same moves using the extended arms and the leverage of the hilt and it felt faster and easier and just as effective.
Won't know if this feeling is true until I do some bouting. Now we are back doing Tuesday night fencing I should get a chance to play with this stuff.
My niche in the fencing classes seems to be fencing dummy. My fencing partner runs people through some moves and then I help them practice them on the move against a live opponent who gradually ramps up the speed and the lack of helpfulness.
(That's the huge difference between drills and free bouting: the helpfulness of the opponent. I start by being very helpful, by doing always the same moves slowly enough and with suitable timing for them to practice the counter, and gradually ramping the speed without changing anything else. Then I start being more evil. It does a lot for their fencing but is actively bad for mine....)
When I can't avoid a competition I feel like yelling "This is not what I do it for. Yeah you can hit me, but dammit I spend 99% of my fencing time teaching people to hit me!"
I guess I'm just pissed I get no respect :) I do from the ones I teach but go to a big gathering and I feel a complete fraud wearing these badges of high rank and being creamed by anyone who can hold a sword.
Others tell me that I'm a hard fight for people of any level, so while an intermediate can hit me if the try hard, they have to try hard and the high level ones have to try equally hard. I can't see it myself.
Ah well. The English session on Thursday made some of the Spadone things clearer. The use of leverage with your hands wide apart on the hilt is utterly vital. Some of the blows are like the longsword equivalent of the one inch punch... to move the sword over a very short range maybe only a few inches, but have enough oomph in it to do damage.
And if you don't keep the movements tight and controlled and use the leverage for power, then as you are doing it with extended arms you will easily be deflected. Nothing half hearted about this.
Agrippa (new translation, brilliant!) has a paragraph on two handed sword. Reckons it's way to dangerous as it's too fast and uncertain for there to be any hope of explaining how it is done.
Now he tells me!
I did find when playing about with English longsword that it really doesn't suit me compared to the Italian. I could do the same moves using the extended arms and the leverage of the hilt and it felt faster and easier and just as effective.
Won't know if this feeling is true until I do some bouting. Now we are back doing Tuesday night fencing I should get a chance to play with this stuff.
My niche in the fencing classes seems to be fencing dummy. My fencing partner runs people through some moves and then I help them practice them on the move against a live opponent who gradually ramps up the speed and the lack of helpfulness.
(That's the huge difference between drills and free bouting: the helpfulness of the opponent. I start by being very helpful, by doing always the same moves slowly enough and with suitable timing for them to practice the counter, and gradually ramping the speed without changing anything else. Then I start being more evil. It does a lot for their fencing but is actively bad for mine....)
When I can't avoid a competition I feel like yelling "This is not what I do it for. Yeah you can hit me, but dammit I spend 99% of my fencing time teaching people to hit me!"
I guess I'm just pissed I get no respect :) I do from the ones I teach but go to a big gathering and I feel a complete fraud wearing these badges of high rank and being creamed by anyone who can hold a sword.
Others tell me that I'm a hard fight for people of any level, so while an intermediate can hit me if the try hard, they have to try hard and the high level ones have to try equally hard. I can't see it myself.
Ah well. The English session on Thursday made some of the Spadone things clearer. The use of leverage with your hands wide apart on the hilt is utterly vital. Some of the blows are like the longsword equivalent of the one inch punch... to move the sword over a very short range maybe only a few inches, but have enough oomph in it to do damage.
And if you don't keep the movements tight and controlled and use the leverage for power, then as you are doing it with extended arms you will easily be deflected. Nothing half hearted about this.
Agrippa (new translation, brilliant!) has a paragraph on two handed sword. Reckons it's way to dangerous as it's too fast and uncertain for there to be any hope of explaining how it is done.
Now he tells me!