Tag: rapier

Serfo was good. I had an amazing Saturday and a pretty good Sunday. I made it out of pools but not out of elims. I had really good fights and did good fencing. I coached others from my group who got further than I did. I didn’t practice any of the headspace stuff I’d been working on.

Castle Wars was the following weekend. By then I was a few days into taking Wellbutrin, and I could see a big difference. My champion won the Invitational Tournament, and I was on the winning side of some awesome melees.

Since then I’ve gone to Krav twice and fencing at least twice. Even with medication, I’m scared to ask people if they want to fence with me. I don’t know what my problem is. I’m pretty sure everyone would say yes.

Krav classes have been small, but I’m making a point to go until the Christmas holidays because once my work schedule changes in the spring, I won’t be able to come regularly.

Last but not least, I’ve come back to the gym. I’m focusing on cardio for now because I want to improve endurance, and I don’t want to change the way my clothes fit. I ran 2.5 miles on the elliptical in 33 minutes this week. It was a struggle, but that’s my starting point.

I’m apprehensive about the Christmas break because the gym will be closed, and it’ll be easy for me to stay inside in a nest of blankets by the fire. I talked to Tiny Nick about working on combative, though, and I’m excited about that.

Today I had a good day at fencing. I loved running around and playing freeze tag during the warm up.

After that, I took the new students (1 or 2 practices in) aside and went over the basics. I really like going over the fundamentals, and I had a great group today.

I got to fence with Nik a bit. I geared down because practice was wrapping up, but we didn’t leave right away.

Instead we stayed late so that Nik and some of the others could practice ringen. I didn’t participate in the wrestling since I don’t trust myself not to deck somebody. I did answer some questions about practical defense and tumbling. We stayed later than I wanted too, but we had a nice night.

This morning Tiny Nick and I were at our own at the gym. We had shoulder day. Here’s the set list.

Tomorrow we wrap the week one day late.

This evening we had fencing. After a warm-up, we had open floor time. Somehow I still didn’t fence a lot. I’m trying to figure out what i need to adjust to get more fencing time. I don’t know if my students expect me to approach them or if they think I’m busy. Next week I’m going to try to make it super clear that I am available to fence.

Friday morning I met my fellow gym rats for leg day. The set list is at the end of this post because Tumblr is dumb.

Friday afternoon/evening, Nik and I drove up to Perry, GA, for an SCA event, Meridies 40th Anniversary .

On Saturday we had an individual tourney and a melee tourney. I went 4 rounds in the individual tourney, and I don’t feel bad about my losses at all. My team won the melee.

On Sunday there were several tourneys: an armatura, two single-elims, and a bear pit (plus a championship among the highest-placing fencers in each tourney). I do notoriously poorly in bear pits (statistically), but I did good fencing. The armatura was pretty good, but I found that I had a target on me during a few rounds (that’s a good thing). I went one round in the single sword tournament and two in the sword & dagger tournament. Again, I feel good about my losses.

I also watched my students and my spouse clean house and represent our school wonderfully. It was just a fantastic weekend full of good fencing among friends.

After two days of fencing, we came home and fenced some more. No kidding.

Tomorrow we’ll be back at the gym bright and early.

Today I didn’t feel like a competent human being because at lunchtime, I realized my pants were on backwards.

Despite that, I learned about the progression of skills when teaching rapier, and I found that learning, translating (for a leftie), and teaching sabre, while difficult, is not as scary as I thought.

Again, I took a lot of notes. Tonight was more revel and less scholarship, but that’s still pretty cool.

I was dressed and ready to fence Wednesday night, but I had a sinus headache, and I was afraid I was getting sick, so I skipped. Thursday was a travel day, so I didn’t work out, but I did get the ball rolling on my personal fitness assessment. I’m excited.

Today was Day 1 of the Rapier and Sabre Pedagogy (RASP) Retreat. We got here with enough time to introduce ourselves before warm-ups. We warmed up with footwork and spent the morning practicing teaching rapier techniques. We started by teaching a simple lunge and worked up to covering cavaciones and other complex short-tempo actions.

After lunch, we got out the sabres. I felt like I was learning how to use a sabre as much as I was learning how to teach someone else how to use one. My partner and I helped each other through the drills without necessarily doing the calls like we did during the rapier portion, and I felt like that worked pretty well.

I got a lot of feedback and took a lot of notes. I hope that sleeping on it will help me process and retain it.

grizzlythresher:

exeunt-pursued-by-a-bear:

darthanonymous:

transmothwoman:

youtube Swordman standing up to gender roles

while you were living under gender roles, i studied the blade

@grizzlythresher

Okay so to give more context to the reason a video like this might be made– often times in fantasy stories, when a woman is given a sword she is given a rapier whilst a man is often given a longsword or an arming sword depending on how big a sword they need. This is largely due to the FALSE belief that rapiers are light swords and therefore more suitable for someone with less strength. Like I said earlier, this cannot be further from the truth. Rapiers are just as heavy as longswords, the weight is just distributed differently. In a longsword, the weight can be spread throughout the sword to allow for greater cutting power. Meanwhile, in a rapier the weight is almost all focused in the hilt, allowing a greater degree of control of the point of the sword, which is required since the rapier is first and foremost a weapon meant for thrusting at small gaps in armor and as such requires a great deal of control. That being said, neither sword is more masculine or feminine than the other, they are both powerful weapons designed for specific tasks on a battlefield.

Thursday was a rest day last week, and Friday was a travel day. Nik and I took a bunch of our students to the Meridian Challenge of Arms (which took place Saturday).

I don’t even know where to begin. Our “kids” fenced so well and were so awesome… they made us look really good, and they weren’t even trying to. They were there to compete and do their thing, but they were just so awesome at it. One won a tournament, two others made it to semi and quarter finals. Some were competing for the first time and winning fights I’m not sure I could win. Nik and I each got taken out of tourneys by our own students. It was an amazing weekend.

I can’t brag on them the whole time. I did do some fencing myself. Like usual, I didn’t bring home the gold. I feel pretty good about my fencing, but there was a bout that I thought I should have put up more of a fight for and another that I think I should have won if I’d taken some chances earlier on. However, barring one exception, all of the touches landed on me were by masters or my own students (and I managed to take out one of the masters I fenced). I can’t complain about that.

Monday was a bit overwhelming after having been on the road. Michael really picked up the slack when it came to planning class, so I’m planning tonight’s class to pay him back. I got to jump in and do some conditioning and cardio with the rest of the class. That was great after being in the car most of Sunday (and eating whatever I could get my hands on over the weekend).

Last night Nik and I went to the gym. We lifted, and then I got in a run. My goal was a mile and a half. On the indoor track, 8 laps is a mile. I managed to run seven, but I broke and walked the eighth. Then I ran laps 9-11 and walked lap number 12 (plus two more to cool down). Even with walking interspersed, I managed to do a mile and a half in about 18 minutes.

It looks like my Krav friends are doing the McGuire’s 5K this month. I’ve been curious but never gone since the run conflicts with Gulf Wars. Since I’m not going to War this year, I think I’ll give this run a try. I’m supposed to predict my time when I sign up. I think 40 minutes is a safe bet. We all know I’m not crazy about running, but I need all the cardio I can get before CIC1. Plus there’s a decent amount of drinking involved after this particular race, so there’s some more incentive.

On Saturday I went to extra practice at UWF with Nik and Tiny Nick! I did a long sword drill that didn’t require me to wear a mask and walked the track. Of the 8 laps I did, I jogged 3 (not all at once – I spread them out). No sweat.

Yesterday we had SCA practice. Because we had a lot of new people, I got to do some mask-off instruction. I sparred with a few of the more experienced students – again in short bursts.

Tonight I’ll be back at Krav. I expect teaching will be the same as usual, but my practice time after class may be limited.

Last night Nik and I went to the gym and climbed the rock wall. I made it about halfway up, got stuck, got nervous, and bailed out. Then I watched him climb to the top. I tried one more time and made it almost to the top (four panels shy) before I got stuck and bailed (I didn’t really give myself time to be scared the second time). I had a really good time, and I think I climbed pretty high, even though I didn’t ring the bell. We’re going to try that again for sure!

After the rock wall, we did some weight lifting. Then we met up with Marco and Tiny NIck! for some fencing. We planned to fence 8-9, maybe 9:15. We closed the gym at 10. I’d say that was a good practice.

We did some sword and dagger work and made the boys practice sword and dagger against case (or brace – two swords). We also played with the dussacks. I showed some “hand sniping” techniques as well.

Tonight will be my and Michael’s second day of teaching Krav unassisted. I came up with my lesson plan yesterday and feel pretty good about it.