Footgear in practice

[Gene Tausk]

Yet another vote for wrestling shoes from me. They are lightweight, protect the foot, but also give the wearer a greater "feel" with the surface under the shoe.

And, they last. At least mine do.


---------------->>>>>>>>>>>>gene tausk
SFS
Director - ARMA Southside Houston

[Jaron Bernstein]

I will sometimes (about 25% of the time or so) train in jeans and tennis shoes. Sweatpants are more comfortable, but I kind of like the idea of training in what I would be wearing if I need to use the skill.

[ColinWheeler]

I think that I will probably continue to train using both kinds of footgear. Jake, you may be correct about actual period footgear battle dress, but I think that were I to have to stand in a shieldwall or skirmishing line nowadays, I would still prefer to wear larger versions of the Spec5 Featherweight steeltoes I bought for my wife a while back. I also agree with Jared's reasoning...I spend about 80 hours a week in my boots, and if I am ever in a combative situation out of my home, I will likely be wearing my boots. I should therefore practice my footwork in various type of shoes so that any compromising of my speed or agility that might occur due to the nature of the footwear will be minimized (or at least not compounded by lack of familiarity). This is the same logic I apply to my firearms practice. I don't turn off all the lights when I shoot at an indoor range, because that will definitely impede my accuracy and precision. But I do practice dryfire with recoil-blank softpellet rounds in the semi-dark from odd positions in my home, not because those things improve my overall skill, but so that I will not be hindered by those conditions in the most likely place for me to have to shoot someone, i.e. the semi-darkness of my house at night from behind a hallway corner or whatever.
Wearing "special swordfighting shoes" for sword practice, to the exclusion of other footgear, seems to have a tinge of "sportification" to it. If the only time you wear that kind of footgear is for sword practice, then that reduces the martial utility of the practice...after all, martial skill is not just about what you can do in the practice hall, but being able to apply that ability to the real world.
Actually, Jake, your point about period footgear sort of coincides with mine, here. If 14th century people were running around in slippers, barefeet, and turn shoes in their everyday world, then it only makes sense to practice exclusively in those same things. Nowadays, however...Of course, this logic could be taken WAY to far. Overextend it, and we could see someone show up to study group meetings in high heels or loafers <img src="/forum/images/icons/grin.gif" alt="" />

[JeffGentry]

Well i for one would never show up to practice or anywhere else for that matter in high heel's. lol <img src="/forum/images/icons/grin.gif" alt="" />

Jeff

[Casper Bradak]

That comes out to a tradition vs utility debate. Some fence for tradition (nowdays anyway) and they'll probably stick to the period feeling footgear. If you do it for self defense reasons, that's a good reason to go with what you'd normally wear.
Personally, I almost always wear wrestling shoes <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

[M Wallgren]

some of us do <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" /> ...

... when we train raipier in a 17th century style high boots. (exellent stabing heels in the face after a down take)

[TimSheetz]

Hi Collin,

I recommend training in various types of footwear. I've trained in historical light slippers both indoors and out (with its accompanying slipperiness and lack of traction that actually seemed to help in the execution of some techniques), wrestling shoes, bare foot, ankle high leather shoes/boots, and with combat boots. The ONLY significant difference was the TRACTION and CLEARANCE. You had to move your feet differently in light lower-traction, thin soled footwear. By Clearance I mean that you will have to change your steps a tiny bit by raising your feet more with thicker soles cause the edges can snag on uneven surfaces. Same thing (picking your feet up more) for when you are in snow, grass and water.

IF you are wearing boots with steel toes, then I think the addded extra weight will begin to affect your performance.

The Comabt boots I used were your partial leather, cloth upper types, like jungle boots. The weight is what will affect you.

I recommend not only switching foot wear around, but also training surfaces. Train in 10 inch snow. Train in loose sand. Train on concrete. Train on gravel. Train in short and long grass, dry and wet.

Train in shallow water.

Train on an incline/decline.

Train with extra weight on you - I use a 20 pound weight vest for this - it changes your center of balance much like wearing a mail hauberk (raises it condsiderably).

Don't pigeon hole yourself into one comfortzone is my suggestion. Of course, you may want to switch footgear on a monthly basis, not necessarily weekly.

My two cents.

Tim

[DavidEvans]

"The only issue I have with historical footwear is that they don't often work well on modern surfaces. You may find yourself skating around the gym "

Thats why you see pictures that show the heel lifted off the ground in quite a few stances!

[robrobertson]

What, you've never heard of fighting with stillettos? <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />
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Overextend it, and we could see someone show up to study group meetings in high heels or loafers
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The Scottish highlanders and the Irish were usually barefoot. Except for when the frost was "most vehement upon the ground."

[Stacy Clifford]

I always train in the same tennis shoes that I wear every day, which are usually cross-trainers, but I also have a pair of lightweight, thin-soled fencing shoes and some leather boots (which you can see in the TX Renn Fest Demo pics), and I've never had any trouble fighting in any of them with the exception that the boots can be pretty slippery. Traction is my only real concern most of the time because I trust my feet to not need extra supervision. I've never really liked thin-soled shoes much though, maybe because I bounce a lot and need the extra cushioning.

[Tim Merritt]

So far for myself: wrestling shoes 75%, kung-fu slippers 10%, crosstrainers 10%, barefoot 4%, turnshoes 1%

[Jared L. Cass]

Casper wrote: "That comes out to a tradition vs utility debate. Some fence for tradition (nowdays anyway) and they'll probably stick to the period feeling footgear. If you do it for self defense reasons, that's a good reason to go with what you'd normally wear."

That's a very good point. We're resurecting and interpreting RMA. While RMA defenently is a good basis for modern self defense, one needs to keep in mind what they wore back then. This foot wear thing is sort of like the armored vs. unarmored fencing we see in the manuals. It would be silly to to do unarmored fighting while wearing a full harness (mostly ignoring half swording and all that jazz:) ). Would it be silly to interpret the manuals while wearing modern clothing and foot wear? How does (or doesn't) what we wear now compaired to then effect our interpretations? It's also sort of like how we all use a variety of tools (blunts, wasters, paddeds) to better grasp certain aspects of the art.

I personally don't think to much on the historical validity of footwear/clothing/ect, but one needs to keep that in mind and keep conscious to what one expects to get from the recreation of RMA. It's a non issue to me...I train in a variety of foot wear with an emphasis on "how can this stuff help me out in the 21st century" but I know that others are happy to concentrate on recreating RMA with out worring about the here and now.

Any of that make sense? <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forum/images/icons/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Jared L. Cass. ARMA Associate, Wisconsin

[Jake_Norwood]

Again, lots of good points. If we are doing Renaissance Martial Arts, and we are trying to properly interpret the techniques, then we need to be wearing footgear and other clothing that will not impede us in that quest. Boots change technique. If we want to do what "they" were doing, we best not do it in boots.

That being said, if we are training for modern self defense purposes (and I propose that the longsword, while there are a lot of useful principles to be learned, is hardly an ideal basis for modern self defense), then we should train in what we wear everyday.

So instead of training in Combat Boots because I wear combat boots in my civillian life, I started wearing light, quick shoes...the same ones I train in. So I modified what I wear daily to suit my training, so to speak. Of course, I wear Combat Boots to work, but that's another story...

Jake

[Jaron Bernstein]

But think about it. You DO wear combat boots to work. And when the army trains you on an exercise (light PT gear aside for PT), you don't wear comfortable, light clothes. You train in boots, layers of clothes and carrying all kinds of gear because that is what you will be expected to do the task with in the real world.

In terms of historical accuracy, that poses an interesting question. If we train strictly in period gear, we are more appropriately recreating the era and skills of HEMA. But that then potentially impinges on our development of using WMA in real life today. But if we train WMA in modern combat boots, as one example, are we really accurately reflecting HEMA training conditions? Perhaps we are best off finding things that would work in both situations (i.e. heavy sweatshirts OR a gambeson, wrestling shoes OR period leather shoes) but avoiding things that are unique to only one period.

[J.Amiel_Angeles]

Would this fall under the same category as the EMA guys training in hakamas and gi?