Middle Ages spread

Realised the other day that the old MAS has begun. Damn! It seems I've just slid into a lifestyle pattern which is pretty sedentary and comfortable and includes quite a lot of goodies, like biccies (my one weakness, or one of my weaknesses) with every cup of tea or coffee.

It started a few weeks ago when Mr. Windsor visited Turku. During the warmup we do this exercise where we sit on the floor and raise the feet about six inces and either hold that position or move the legs. It just hurts my back and I feel not just a pull in my lower abs but like I have absolutely no power there to keep my feet off the floor. Frustrating!

I often enjoy watching programmes on TV where overweight people struggle with new exercise and dietary regimes in order to lose weight and be happier. I must admit to feeling rather smug as I watch sipping my tea and having another couple of biscuits or some more chocolate, thinking "that will never be me, after all I have self control!". But do I? How much do the ups and downs in everyday life affect our self-control? I could blame change of season, lack of light, worries about work, etc. for the desire to feel "full", which brings a certain feeling of satisfaction. These causes though may be just be a small part of the problem.

Ok. I'm not obese. I have a belly and love handles and I probably could do with beginning jogging again, but I still think I'm moderately fit. I guess the balance of food intake versus physical exercise has shifted so that the former outweighs the latter. Pun intended. What to do?

Well, first off, cut down on the calories. I'm not the sort of person who believes in the cold turkey approach. I think though that rather than having something sweet with every cup of tea or coffee, one small treat per day is ok. But that's it, ONE! In the past I've noticed that when I do this, I can get used to having less but enjoying it more. It's also not to just cut out the sweet stuff. Good diet is about good choices and certainly in my case, it requires conscious effort. I often get to the checkout and wonder how those choccy biccies got into the shopping basket, while the fruit and veg I planned to buy are nowhere to be seen. It's funny but kind of pathetic at the same time.

The other plan is to do more physical stuff. I don't feel like I really need to ramp this up to the point where I'm sweating buckets and ready to puke. I used to train like that in basketball and later in karate. I didn't enjoy it then and I sure as hell wouldn't enjoy it now. However, to do enough to get out of my comfort zone and to raise a sweat would be just the job, and this 3-4 times a week. The sword training is ok for this, it's occasionally demanding, but only occasionally. Anyway, we're not training to get fit per se, even though good conditioning is essential to be a good swordsman.

I'm thinking about going to Peru for 5-6 weeks in 2010 with my wife so I this gives me a good target to aim for, actually more to improve fitness than to lose weight. However, if I can get the balance back, I'm fairly sure one will take care of the other.

Back from Swordfish 2009

Just got in the door this morning and am trying to drum up some enthusiasm for working from home today on the laptop. Well, what can I say? Swordfish 2009 was a blast and I had a lot of fun despite feeling somewhat fluish on saturday afternoon and evening.

The first class I attended was Harry Winter's class on German dagger fighting. This was pretty interesting and I got some good ideas on warm up and reaction drill that we might use in our own training. Overall, the material itself was not hugely different from Fiore dagger but the presentation itself was kept fast-paced, intelligent, clear and by turns downright funny. Harry is a big man but moves very smoothly and quickly for all that and his technique was very impressive also.

After lunch I went along to Matt Galas class on Montante or Portuguese longsword. This style seemed to consist of, at least at first viewing, of twiddly sword forms, which increased in complexity as the class wore on. However, Matt told us that different forms were described in the manuscript for specific purposes, like fighting multiple attackers, defending a bridge or an alley, or fighting on a ship. The forms themselves were actually beautiful and a superb workout but quite a few people seemed to drop out as there were no pair drills and as the forms became more difficult, concentration was quite hard to maintain. This might simply be a feature of some people attending Swordfish, who seem to like a "good bash" and they weren't getting what they wanted from this class. All in all though it was very enjoyable and I'm glad I stayed til the end. I look forward to seeing Portuguese longsword thrown into the mix of German and Italian longsworders in tournaments in the future.

I was feeling rather fluish on Saturday so I just took it easy in the morning and watched the sword and buckler and singlesword tournaments. The former was a little bit too bash-crash for me, but I really liked the single sword comp. The vibe was completely different and it was a really nice opportunity to see a Silver exponent take on sabre and backsword fighters from other traditions. I have a new found respect for the backsword and think it would be fun to take it up. In the afternoon I took part in only half of Dierk Hagedorn's class on techniques from the Falkner manuscript. Although it was German style, which I'm not so familiar with, the clear instructions were easy to follow and the techniques shown very interesting. My headache had returned so when we had a break I packed it in and went to watch the rest of the nylon longsword tournament. It was interesting and fun to watch but the organisation took quite a lot of time and I think it may have been given too much weight in the overall event, with only one other option for those less interested in competition. Oh well, can't please everyone I guess.

On Sunday morning I was supposed to go to Fabrice Cognot's class but tiredness, flu, a slight hangover and laziness made me just take things easy and move from class to class, checking out what was going on. From what I caught while watching on the sidelines, Fabrice's class on Fiore was interesting as his interpretation is very close yet still different from ours. Ilkka Hartikainen held a very interesting class on Bolognese dagger, which looks very elegant. By comparison, Claus Soerensen from the Laurentiusgildet had a class on half-sword techniques (in armour) from Tallhofer which was brutally elegant. Both were great fun to watch and judging by those taking part, even more fun to do.

Although this was my third year at Swordfish, I caught the phenomenon that is the "Midnight Brawlers Club" for the first time. This is where anyone, regardless of age, sex, whatever, can take on anyone else in some friendly wrestling. It at first seemed incongruous that two guys in their underpants trying to twist each others' heads off, would then jump up and hug the other affectionately at the end of the bout, but I was told that this is precisely the essential element that makes this happening so popular year after year.

A big thanks to all the GHFS people who worked so hard to organise this event and did such a good job yet again. I'm looking forward to the next one already!

Third thoughts

I've had a rethink about the nylon longsword competition which will be held at Swordfish '09 in Gothenburg this year. Basically, I decided to pull out and maybe attend Dierk Hagedorn's class on half-swording instead.

My reasons:

-I'm not very good at freeplay and my performance at the Medieval Mayhem overall, and particularly against the Mikkonator was crap. So, I'm just not ready for free bouting yet.
-Different rulesets and competition mode is different from the context we normally do freeplay.
-In terms of learning stuff useful for the practice of Fiore, there isn't much (at my current level, such as it is) that I would gain by taking part in the competition.
-I'd learn more from the half-sword class with Mr. Hagedorn.
-I started to stress about the competition and worrying if I was ready and all that crap. Yes, I do stress about things too easily, I freely admit. So, this worry was starting to take away the joy of the whole Swordfish experience, which is just daft. If the joy isn't in it, then there's something wrong. This has become my yardstick for my whole attitude to swordsmanship. It doesn't preclude hard work and regular training as these can be a joy in themselves.

Instead, if I want to have a friendly spar with people at the event, I will have more than ample opportunity to do so. I just have to be open to the experience, have a laugh, get a bit sweaty and maybe a bruise or two, make friends in the process, learn, consider and perhaps discard new stuff, then discuss it all over a pint or dram in the pub afterwards :-)

Flappy swords

Dave Rawlings of Boar's Tooth and some other chaps are marketing plastic wasters and armour for freeplay. To see their gear in action, click the following link:

www.fightmedieval.com

I'll say it straight up......I hate the armour, they look like robocops with swords. What's wrong with a nice gambeson or fencing jacket with a leather plastron?

The swords themselves, at least in the clip, looked rather flappy in the flat although we are assured by people from Schola Gladiatoria who've had the good fortune to try them, that it's just the top third that has the most flex. To my limited knowledge though, they still looked shinai-quick. I still think the Pentti wasters from Gothenburg look pretty good and were quite ok to handle.

Nevertheless, they don't look too bad overall and if they can really produce them at 40 quid a pop, then maybe it would be a good idea to invest in a few for our club, as they HAVE to be better than the wooden wasters we currently have. I'm looking forward with interest to see how these fare when more people can use them and write their own reviews.

Mucus!

It's a horrible word, isn't it? Yet I've been producing rather a lot of it all week as I've been laid up sick at home. I guess a fairly stressful and busy summer finally caught up with me and dealt me a good belt. Felt like it anyhow. While I have enjoyed the time spent at home just to sleep, rest and eat, I don't enjoy feeling weak, having headaches and mountains of tissues all around me. Basically, it sucks being sick! I'm on the road to recovery and I'll probably head back to work tomorrow but it'll only be indoors stuff this week. No diving for me!

I thought that we would be finished well in advance of the end of October so I could easily take some days off and enjoy going to Swordfish 2009. Now it seems we'll have to work right up to the last minute and into November to get all the pieces into place. We've got about 500 videos to watch and the underwater nature trail to break down for winter.
http://www.metsa.fi/sivustot/metsa/en/Projects/NordenProjects/NordicBlueParks/underwatertrailsFinland/Sivut/NordicBlueParksUnderwaterTrails.aspx
It never ends, does it?

Speaking of Swordfish 2009, there is a pretty interesting line up and I'm still looking forward to attending. I initially decided to take part in the longsword tournament but I have since decided to do something else instead, namely take part in the half-swording techniques from the Falkner manuscript, by Mr. Dierk Hagedorn. I had the pleasure to chat with him briefly last year and he was sound. Why did I change my mind? I had started to get a bit stressed about the whole thing, particularly after my rather dismal performance last year. I attended the Medieval Mayhem last weekend at the Helsinki salle (which was great fun btw!) and had a chance for a brief natter on the subject with Ilkka Hartikainen. I asked him if he intended to take part this year and he said probably not. When I asked why, he told me that he wasn't so fond of the competition-like approach and that it was much more fun for him to just have a bit of informal play with people he could choose, and that he felt he had nothing to prove. His attitude gave me a lot of pause for thought.

Perhaps I'm simply not yet ready for such a tournament? Given that the tournament rules (as in any competition) will result in a certain type of modified behaviour to best take advantage of the rule system in place, what would I actually and constructively learn about what I know/don't know of italian swordsmanship? I really don't seem to take competition-pressure too well. Ironically, the only person putting me under pressure is, myself! So, I figured I'd get more out of the half-swording class than the tourney and if I want to have a friendly spar with people while I'm there, then I'll probably get ample opportunity. The fact that I don't yet have a plastic sword for the competition, nor intend to buy lacrosse gloves for it either, because "hard" protection is not allowed, are just little contributing details.

Synthetic swords and banana gloves

Sound odd? Well, it's one way of describing some of the equipment used at the longsword tournament at the upcoming Swordfish 2009 event. The first term is apparent, the latter refers to how the players hand protection looks like to me, i.e. those who use lacrosse gloves.

Well, I've been reviewing my abysmal performance last year at the biggest sword-related event in the Nordic countries, hosted by those very enthusiastic and frankly tireless chaps and ladies from the Gothenburg Historical Fencing School.

Basically, I sucked. So, after some reviewing I feel I need to concentrate on, inter alia:

-protecting my hands and attacking the opponents'
-attacking in proper distance
-being more and constantly mobile
-changing guards
-using the thrust
-taking better advantage of largo and stretto distances
-learn to use the circlular step and not be so linear

Hmm, this will give me plenty of material to work on between now and the end of October....

I'd like my style to improve, perhaps win a clean point or two and have anybody watching still be able to say.."oh, he's a Fiorista".

We tried some slow freeplay at training last saturday and it went ok I think but I still got hit on the head a lot, and took a "lethal" thrust to the throat where I attacked, missed and ran myself onto the incoming point. I wasn't relaxed doing the freeplay, nor indeed was I slow and deliberate as was the oringinal intention, in itself designed to allow for constant motion and a way to stop the freezing. I think I completely forgot anything to do with the seven sword drills we've trained and sometimes it looked messy and well, shite. On the positive (sort of) I found that I could exploit the stops in others by grabbing their swords, something made easier for me by their attacks were occasionally made out of distance. I would say that this was feature of lack of experience though, not something that I'll get away with in Helsinki, nor in Gothenburg. Still, it was a lot of fun and gave us all good feedback about things, albeit basic, that we really need to train more. Thanks to E and M for making it a good training session.

Next weekend should be a blast as there is a two day "Medieval Mayhem" seminar, which should be loads of fun and a chance to spar against others in a variety of weapons. I'm looking forward to it already.

Poster for new Beginner's Course in Turku!

This is the new flier for the next Beginner's Course and I think it looks absolutely fab! We had talked about it before about how it should look and that it needed to be "simpler".

As the Yanks would say...."Good job!"