Lesson plan: Starting to increase the repertoire by adding another defence and a couple of attacks of second intent.
Warm-up: Footwork, Oberhau swapping from lines B to G.
Meyer's Flying (Fliegender) Thrust drill: Start in Low guard, narrow stance
for the lunge, lunge three times into Langort, each time recovering with the front foot only (back foot is planted for whole drill). Repeat, with lunge in first (as in
Meyer's picture).
Had a great crowd tonight as Jon brought his brother, David, along and Amy and Lorna brought along a friend of theirs, Emma.
After some footwork practice to get warmed up, we did some cutting drills.
1: Defence strokes from Oberhut to Alber, changing off between B-F line and the H-D line. Start by cutting from Oberhut to Langort with a step, then following through to Alber; gather for the next step while lifting the sword to Oberhut on the other side for the next cut. The final aim is to string these cuts together in a fluid motion with correct stepping.
It was a small gathering this week.
Lord Sebastian has recently joined us from Thamesreach and although his gear is still in transit from far off places he came long and was introduced to Meyer's rapier style.
Footwork and basic positions were covered and we ran through the basic basic attacks and defences, though high, low and medium variations of each and then went through an exercise that Eleanor and William had been reviewing the previous week.
We welcomed a new fencer, Jon, so while I went through a quick introduction to Meyer rapier, David and Nicola worked on some more sophisticated maneouvers.
Later, Nicola and I took turns playing "fencing chess" with David. The idea is to fence slowly, so it comes down to a game of: I do this, you do that, so I want to go here etc. I found it a nice way to analyse my fencing - identifying mistakes I repeatedly make - and I think it will be a useful way to intoduce new plays that I've had trouble making work at speed.
For the rapier tourney at the Royal Visit we had playing:
King Gabriel, Don William, Don Emrys, Baron Benedict, Lord Ludwig
Lesson Plan: Basics from Meyer. Attack and defence against high, middle and low line. Identifying attacks and presenting the right defence from limited options. Recovering and blade feel.
Warm-up: Footwork
Review: Attack (lunge) and defence (parry) to lower, middle and upper body.
During the training on Wednesday, Nicola and Patrick practised against each other with every combination of weapons to hand (except a Case of daggers - they ran out of time for that).
Patrick showed how bad he is with Case and that he needs to void with his back foot when parrying. He also discovered that when he gets frustrated he forgets to gather the back foot before lunging, which does nothing to ease his frustration.
More Manciolino. Working from the Leoni translation and introduction, we worked on the first five attacks and responses from Guardia di Testa.
Warm-up: Lunge practice.
Review: Guardia di Testa, di Faccia (both high guards), Porta di Ferro Stretta and Coda Lunga e Alta (both low guards). Parries can be accomplished by transitions between these guards. Cuts in this style tend to be "incomplete" or Colpo Imperfetto rather than Colpo Finito. Reviewed Mandritto, Riverso, Stramazzone.
A first look at Manciolino. Working from the Leoni translation and introduction, we tried the first four attacks and responses from Guardia di Testa.
Problem: There is little footwork specified. Instances where footwork is specified are passes, except one instruction to step with the right foot at the opponent to make sure you get close enough to strike with a cut. Inspection of the rest of the chapter shows this is the approach throughout. I note one instruction to step towards an attack.
Lesson plan: Rapier based on Meyer. Development of multi-part attack and response drills, starting well out of measure. Discussion of fencing theory.
Started with the usual footwork practice.
Exercise 1: To review lunge basics, checking if head and upper body is protected by hilt.
A steps into measure and lunges against B. B does not defend, but merely attempts to hit A over the hilt.
Perform both inside (hand in fourth), and outside (both hand in fourth and hand in second).
