Fencing Journal (week of) 1/11   1 comment

Once-a-week practicing continues.  Work has a nasty habit of sitting on Tuesdays and squeezing the breath out of them.  Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, too.  Thursdays, also.  But Thursdays are sacrosanct.

In lieu of making practice on Tuesday, I hit the gym on Wednesday and did 35 minutes of cross-country on the stationary bike.  Not great, but my conditioning has been asstacular for somewhat over two months now (like, six months, or more).  I’m hitting the gym again today (Monday), and am going to try for three times this week.  Despite being down five pounds, my BP has been up above 140 for a few years now, and is creeping higher.  And last week I had a blood test that showed a slightly elevated FPG (a couple points above upper limit of normal).

All of this Will Not Do.  I have a strong and habitual desire to not die young (by which I mean: Before all the rest of you).  I wish to die at age 90 from a heart attack in a hottub caused by the attentions of a young, beautiful woman (got a better way to go?).

The current plan is to increase exercise and cut back on stress (if the job will cooperate), and to consider changes to my diet (but just consider, more as a threat to my body than as a real plan: “Get in line, or I start eating salad!”).  While weight loss continues to be high on my agenda, the fact of the matter is my BP has gone from slightly-high to we-have-a-problem while my weight has decreased.  We’ll see how all this goes.

Tai Stabby, Part 2

Letia was at practice on Thursday, and asked for some ideas on solo footwork drills she could do in her hallway.  I made up a list for her (advance the length, retreat, left, right, lunge/recover forward, do all of the above in a deep stance, do all of the above very slowly, do all of the above with variation in distance, wash rinse repeat), then we considered the most effective way to do these.  Usually, in line drills, you say “advance” and everybody takes a step forward, and that’s about the sum total of participants’ involvement.  So we worked instead on paying close attention to every movement in an advance, and all other footwork motions.  Taking the advance as an example, we thought through what has to move first (the forward heel), second (the back hip), and third (actually, nothing else.  When the heel leaves the ground and the hip presses down sufficiently, there is no choice but to advance).   Then there’s the recovery of the rear foot forward.  I’ve been trying to break down the mechanics of the other rudiments of footwork over the past few days.  We’ll see where it ends up.

Afterall, the fewer movements necessary, and the smaller they can be, the faster they happen and the less they alert your opponent to what is happening.  Also, each individual movement is a point at which an action can be stopped or redirected.  And if I can wrap my brain around this sort of physiokinetic approach, then it’ll just be another two or three years of constant, diligent work to make my form follow what my brain has figured out.  Woo hoo!

Previous Week, continued

Really, most of practice Thursday was a continuation of themes from the week before:

  • Attacking without risk  was slightly more successful this week, but the shift in strategy has actually opened me up to more double kills as I test plans of attack
  • Buckler game has improved, especially with consideration of the form limitation mentioned in the post on case.  Moving my buckler slightly further away from my body gave it much more effect, with much less need to flail.

Over-committing to lunges on muddy ground, with legs that had been working the bike the day before, turns out to cause sore knees.  I wonder if there’s a way to do 100 lunges (fencing lunges, not workout lunges) in the gym without looking like a total goob.  Probably not.

Meanwhile: Joe, Thursday ask me about the priest drill

Posted January 18, 2010 by wistric in Journal

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