Swordfish HEMA event 2008

[Axel Pettersson]

Hi guys, I realize most of you are located in the US, but if you by chance will be in Europe this fall I just wanted to give a heads up that we will organize the third anual Swordfish event here in Gothenburg (the first hosted by David Lindholms crew in Malmö, the second one by us in Gothenburg and this one also in Gothenburg).

The event will take place from October 31- November 2. We rent a large facility with several halls for lectures and practice, as well as sleeping halls, a 24/7 reception with a HEMA shop and of course our own pub. Breakfast is included in the prize (which is not set yet but it won't be much).

We are trying hard to profile this event as one that gives you a real physical challenge with long, tough sessions, good martial intent and lots and lots of sparring, so ARMA people will feel right at home .

This is the list of instructors/lecturers/retailers so far, I will update it as we are still awaiting answers from some known faces.

Website now up, visit http://www.ghfs.se/swordfish

Hope to see you there, more info to follow!

LIST OF WORKSHOPS AND LECTURES:

Martin Wallgren (MnHFS), Half Sword from Talhoffer

Kim Moén (MnHFS), demo on Kampfringen in MMA (this is gonna be interesting!)

David Lindholm (MHFS) , Staff

Roland Warzecha (Hammaborg) Sword and Viking shield

Milo Thurston (LSD), smallsword (1), pugilism (2)

Hans Jörnlind (independent, former ARMA Sweden) Rapier from Fabris

Todd Törnqvist & Johan Lundby Söderstam (SHFS), sabre

James Marwood (Schola Gladiatoria), modern combatives (1), Bartitsu (2)

Björn Sollander & Johan Rydstedt (UES), messer

Ilkka Hartikainen (SESH), Fiores spear (1), bolognese spada da filo(2)

Guy Windsor (SESH), falling on hard surfaces (1), freeplay preparation (2)

Claus Sörensen (Laurentsguildet), lecture on Talhoffer from Claus master thesis


We will also have coached sparring, where you can sign up alone or in pairs for time with an instructor who observe your sparring (or spar with you) and give you feedback. We want people to fight fight FIGHT! How else can we claim to martial artists?

So far we have instructors for:

German longsword (Anders Linnard, GHFS)

1.33/Lutegerus: Roland Warcheza (Hammaborg)

Rapier (Hans Jörnlind, independent)

There will also be a hall open for sparring and/or comparision of interpretations or whatever takes your fancy.

As last year, retailers from Albion Europe (www.albion-europe.com)and Nidingbane (www.nidingbane.se)will be there to display and sell weapons and equipment, we will probably sell nylon wasters and aluminium messers from our own Pentti Kangasmaa as well.


cheers/Axel

[Mike Cartier]

looks like fun Axel

get some video of the Sword and Buckler applid to Viking shield fights, i would love to see some.

good luck

[Jeremiah Backhaus]

If only you could schedule it in August - when I will be in Gothenburg. Ah well, best of luck with the event, and I will get in touch with you Axel, about getting together when I am over there.


-Jeremiah (GFS)

[Jay Vail]

Very cool. Wish I could go.

[Axel Pettersson]

@Mike,

we will sure try! We have more than six hours of DVD footage from last years swordfish, and about a gazillion pictures, a lot of that will eventually be put up on youtube or something as well.

In the mean time, here are some footage that Hammaborg themselves has put up on the net from their sword and shield work: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=1823CE28E5A3E116

@Jeremiah,

sounds awesome man, great news! Just give me a heads up some time before you are in town, regular classes for longsword/wrestling are on tuesday and thursday evenings and sunday afternoons, swedish and/or huttons sabre every other saturday midday, and sword and buckler (1.33) on sunday evenings (directly after the longsword class), we are planning to add some more classes as well, and evenings with solely sparring. But we can probably get something together for any day of the week, looking forward to it!

@Jay,

thanks, we have great hopes and ideas for this event and plan to do it every year, so perhaps one day in the future we can have you do a dagger class in it (we already have your book)!

[Jay Vail]

looks like fun Axel

get some video of the Sword and Buckler applid to Viking shield fights, i would love to see some.

good luck

Axel, I'd like to see those vids too. I've really enjoyed the Hammaborg vids on Youtube, but can't download them to my laptop so I can work in their material in detail, especially the large shield stuff. I've tried a few of their tricks in freeplay and they worked well. So I am looking forward to seeing their material in detail.

Also, I hope the dagger book is useful to you.

[Axel Pettersson]

looks like fun Axel

get some video of the Sword and Buckler applid to Viking shield fights, i would love to see some.

good luck

Axel, I'd like to see those vids too. I've really enjoyed the Hammaborg vids on Youtube, but can't download them to my laptop so I can work in their material in detail, especially the large shield stuff. I've tried a few of their tricks in freeplay and they worked well. So I am looking forward to seeing their material in detail.

Also, I hope the dagger book is useful to you.

Everything that I get permission from the Hammaborg crew to put online, I will try to do.

/A

[Axel Pettersson]

First post updated with more info.

[Axel Pettersson]

FINALLY the registration is open! visit http://www.ghfs.se/swordfish


Note: we are still talking with some more instructors so there might still be some classes added to the schedule, you will be able to change your selected classes if something new pops up that you don't want to miss.

See you there!/A

[Axel Pettersson]

We hare happy to announce that Dierk Hagedorn from Hammaborg will hold a workshop on Winden in the German longsword system.


We are also ahppy to announce that Scott Brown of Houston, USA will be holding a lecture on training methods as well as two workshops:

using advanced training methods on the concept of Abzug in the German longsword tradition

and:

using advanced training methods on the mechanics of the overbind from the 1.33 sword and buckler manuscript.

Note, "advanced training methods" does not mean that you have to be an advanced student to participate in this class!

Registration for these workshops will be available soon, you don't need to register for the lecture as it will be held in the evening in the pub (as will Claus lecture btw).

At Swordfish we will sell various equipment, books, DvD's, nylon wasters, lacrosse gloves and fencing masks (cheap!) in the reception.

[Axel Pettersson]

Just wanted to let you know we had a good time, well over 100 participants from 8 different countries, alot of fighting, alot of beer and alot of fun. As always Midnight Brawlers Club was very popoular .

Here are two of my (3) fights from the nylon longsword tournament, the rules were pretty much anything goes except attacks to the spine or neck or kicks or breaks against the natural bending direction of the joint, mostly just common sense. The fights were 2x1 minutes.

FIght 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F9g1kvbF5Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjb8MxmayZo

Fight 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVNh3tE6I_g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIPQm-qrEx8

And here is a short news clip made by Swedish television:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIGjNSO5o5Q

We have more footage so I will try to get hold of some video of sword and shield and spear and shield sparring that Hammaborg and the Danes from Århus did if they agree to it, as you guys wanted.

[Jeremiah Backhaus]

Axel,

Hey man, thanks for sharing some great footage. I really enjoyed watching the bouts. I had fun watching them, and trying to see if I recognized anyone else in the background! A big hello to my friends at GHFS!

I wanted to offer some constructive criticism, if you don't mind. In your fights I saw a lot of physicality, but not a lot of tacticality. You moved around the entire fight, but you didn't seem to really be setting your opponent up much. This was much more evident in your bout with Tim (?) (the first one). You actually moved so much trying to get him to do something that you weren't sure what he was going to do, and that got you whacked a few times. (it seemed that he was declared the winner, is that right?) I'm not saying that I think you should completely change your style, but if you calmed down a bit, didn't move so much and tried to tactically get (force) him to do one or two things that you can surely defeat, it will go differently for you. All in all though, it looked like a very fun bout, and your physicality was impressive.

On the second bout, you didn't move as much, but there was WAAAAY more moving the sword in ways that weren't cuts, strikes, thrusts, or transitions into guards. Plus here it seemed your guards we too far into your body to really guard you in any way! You were obviously faster than this opponent. (especially since he was resting his sword on his shoulder) This opponent kept his sword tied to his shoulder no matter what guard you went to. This gives you time to think. Liechtenauer tells us to maintain the "Vor" in the fight, and when you have a guy who isn't attacking, you don't need to work so hard to keep it. This one, I am quite certain you won, so congratulations!

Axel, again, I really enjoyed watching this, And way to get a spot on TV. Thanks for listening to my rant, I hope this helps. I will send you a PM to let you know how I think you could work something into the GHFS practice to help with this. Good training and glad to hear it was a success.

-Jeremiah (SA)

P.S. Say hi to my friend Justin over there, spar with him once for me! (he told me he was training with you guys more now.)

[Axel Pettersson]

Hi Jeremiah!

Thank you very much for your reply, and for your constructive criticism, this is a main reason I post on this forum . The rest of GHFS says hi too!

On the fights:

I think you are correct in your observation in the first fight (against Tim), that I move a bit too much without a thought behind it. This was my first competitive fight and I was quite "over eager", which shows as I try to provoke him to leave an opening for me and while doing so I move in too close without cover, the result is that I get hit on the hands alot. Calming down as you say is the answer.

In the other fight:
Moving the sword constantly like that is something I have experimented with as a theory on going on Meyers advise to never stay in a guard at all. The result is almost Gatka like. It is difficult to fight like that in the beginning (and I still don't have it working as I want, especially in a competitive setting which in general is more stressful than ordinary sparring), for me it requires a more acute sense of distance, timing and tempo than using the guards a s a "ready position", though I do mix the two usages of guards. When you get the hang of it though it does work real well though!

I am not at all sure this is what Meyer means, and if it was then it still doesn't mean that is what for example Ringeck or Kal meant us to do, but it is a fun concept to test.

When you say that my guard is too close to the body to cover me, do you mean the moments when I pull my blade in pflug so high up i almost looks like I am holding a vom tag, only with my hands almost down to my waist? That is an error in my fencing I am trying to work on, I think it is a byproduct of constantly changing guards, and as you say it doesn't cover me at all, or present a threat to my opponent. Good call.

On competitions: we were very reluctant at first to have competitions, and we were worried of what the result would be, but so far it has been positive. The rules are very loose and does not really restrict your fighting, but the competition adds more stress and nerve to the fight, which shows for example in the mistakes I make in my fights due to being too pumped up or feeling the stress too much. You can achieve this in other ways too, by for example prize plays, gatherings in Dog Brothers style (something we are thinking of doing for next year) etc. Competitions are another version of this, and in our context has its place. Plus it allows us to beat on and get beat up by Danes, Finns, Brits, Germans etc .

Thanks again for your comments, I just now saw that you have pm'ed me, will reply to that too, cheers my friend!/Axel