Hello!

[Ben Michels]

Having registered, I figured I would make a post to introduce myself... as well as include a couple questions and comments.

I live in south central Pennsylvania (right on the Maryland boarder, north of Baltimore) and was introduced to the SCA by a friend of mine, since Pennsic is only about four hours away from me. Although I will probably dive into the SCA next summer, and it seems like a lot of fun, it does not seem to have the martial arts training element that I am looking for.

I actually found the ARMA website a couple of months ago and prompty read through 80% of it. I somehow missed the forums that time around. Just on this first page I found a lot of ideas and concepts that will help me, such as melting down the lead fishing weights to balance the (crude) longsword waster I made. I have quite a few pages of threads to go through!

As far as my personal study has progressed, such as it is, I've only spent time on the basic guards and strikes found in Secrets of German Medieval Swordsmanship by Tobler. I have been going about it alone and would very much like a group to be associated with.

On that note, is there anyone in my area?

Thanks!

[Ben Strickling]

Hi, Ben! Welcome to the forum. I'm not sure how far you are from the New Jersey groups (you can find a listing of ARMA study groups here: http://www.thearma.org/Practice/partners.htm) but I'm down here in Greenbelt, Maryland. Our DC study group meets in Northern Virginia, which might be a bit too far from you, but since I live in Maryland, I'm up in Baltimore quite often and that doesn't seem to be too far from where you are. In case, you're interested in getting together sometime I'll send you a PM with my information.

[Ben Michels]

I found the study group page an hour after making the post. Observatory Park is about an hour and a half away from me (which really isn't too bad all things considered), and Baltimore is 45 minutes away. The York part in my profile was simply the nearest large city that people might recognize. I actually live in New Freedom/Shrewsbury which are the last towns before you run into Maryland, right on I83.

[Ben Strickling]

Great. An hour and a half isn't that bad and we'd be glad to have you if you'd like to drop by. As you've probably seen, our practice schedule and location are on the website and we're pretty good about keeping it up -to-date if there's any change or cancellation. You can PM or email me if you have any questions. Hope to see you there.