More Slum - Fu: Sparring on the cheap

[JeanryChandler]

Hey, it's been a while since you have heard from ol' drifter bob, and I bet y'all are just raring for more slum fu.

Here is a little mavica clip I call "drifter bob schools an enthusiastic but poorly trained buddy in the arts of slum-fu"
(for those who don't know I'm the fat guy)

http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/e/deodand23/connoly2.mpg

Here is a picture of some of our "field expedient" gear, to use a military term.

http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/e/deodand23/cheap.jpg

You can see here jury- rigged gauntlets, helmets, bracer, and bucket-lid buckler.

The gauntlets are made from ordinary work gloves with cut out pieces of closed cell foam duct taped on. You can use either the camping pad or pipe insulation foam for this. These work surprisingly well and are a very cheap alternative to the often more clumsy hockey or even lacrosse gloves.

Next the helmets. Both are based on bycicle helmets, which are light and breathe well. I have also made more hard core ones out of army steel pots and police riot helmets. The face guards are respectively a hockey guard bought on ebay for like $2, and a catchers masks from a thrift store.

The helmets work ok, every once in a while I make a really good one but I haven't mastered the art. All in all lacrosse helmets are better and you can get them on Ebay now for around $10 -$20, but these field expedient ones have been useful extras whenever those extra two or three people show up on a sparring day.

Then the bracer. Thats closed cell foam, duct tape, and some medium strength sheet metal. Not bad actually, in fact somewhat better generally than used sports pads. But you will get laughed at by people if they think it is intended to be real armor.

finally, the old reliable bucket top buckler. These don't last forever, but they do hold up surprisingly well if you pad the rims right. And they are cheap!

Anyway, I know most of you ARMA guys are respectable citizens who can afford real gear, but just wanted to provide a bit of inspiration for the odd po-bucker who might need gear like this!

DB

[Mike Cartier]

Good stuff DB
i like the look of the gloves, we use a mix of hockey and lacrosse gloves but it is not always the best solution, i will have to check out your equipment when we are up there visiting your neck of the woods for the southern ARMA get together.

I like that shield too

[JeanryChandler]

Any comments on the fighting technique in the video clip? Footwork, cutting, parrying etc?

[Tony_Indurante]

None of the strikes thrown were done with proper footwork. In every case the foot was either stationary or was trailed behind the body and/or the strike. You should be trying to step and strike at the same time and with the same foot as your weapon hand. Proper footwork will not only give you stronger blows, but your reach will greatly improve- you look like you are shorting yourself around 6"-1' of reach with every blow. You will also have more oppertunities to use distance and time to your advantage- as it is, with improper footwork, you have to be almost on top of each other to have a chance to hit. You may also want to try stepping offline when you attack- moving straight forward and backward every time is not nearly as effective as traversing.

The strikes don't have much in the way of follow through or intent- this applies more to your partner than to you, but neither of you are using enough intent to generate follow through. Your blows are more like slaps than cleaving strikes. It's easy to slap someone with a SLO, but takes much more effort and strength to strike with a "killing" blow.

Hey, you asked for comments. <img src="http://www.thearma.org/forum/images/icons/grin.gif" alt="" />

[JeanryChandler]

thanks for the pointers. I always thought I usually step forward as I strike but I guess I'm not doing it right. I think maybe I was holding back a bit because my opponent in that clip hasn't sparred in more than 5 years and I was trying not to hit him too hard (I get a lot of complaints about that!)

my main purpose that day was to get some more practice parrying with the rondel dagger, which is something we never did in the old days, that I'm just starting to get comfortable with, along with flat parries and edge strikes.

>The strikes don't have much in the way of follow through or >intent- this applies more to your partner than to you,

Not sure about his strikes, he never landed any! <img src="http://www.thearma.org/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

As for the cuts, it's something I really don't know much about except for what I've read recently in Johns books on Medieval and Renaissance swordsmanship. We never used to even consider that in the old days, probably our biggest weakness, we fought more like with clubs or sticks than with swords, any good hard hit was a kill.

By follow-through, do you mean a draw-cut while stepping forward or aside, or just a harder cut lingering a bit longer, or something else? Maybe I should hit the book on that, I know John goes into this at length and it's a fundamental ARMA tenent.

As for moving side to side etc., I am well aware of this tactic... my footwork may suck but I usually do alright anyway, even against more experienced opponents <img src="http://www.thearma.org/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

I'll try to get a few more clips this weekend, maybe you can give me a few more pointers based on them.

What is an SLO?

thanks again for your interesting comments,
JR

[John_Clements]

I would add to Tony's comment about footwork, follow-through intent, and contact, that you really should stop and restart your bout after each killing or incapacitating blow. Otherwise, the lesson is lost and it's just playing swordslap.

JC

[JeanryChandler]

Ouch! Sword-slap is it! And I had such a high opinion of myself! Actually we were stopping between rounds at least long enough to aknowledge a kill, but we were hurrying for the camera. Slum fu again- the old borrowed Sony Mavica digital camera we were using only takes movies in fixed 15 second blocks now for some reason, and won't go back to regular mode, so we were trying to rush two 'fights' into one clip, otherwise we have a bunch of wasted footage. Here is anohter clip where you can see this more clearly.

http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/e/deodand23/connoly1.mpg

Normally we do 5 'fights' with a short pause between each, and then stop for five minutes or so to discuss the fights.

I will work harder on my footwork. I find it very challenging to learn to "pull my punches" while still striking with my normal aggressive intent, if you will. A lot of it for me is instinctive now.

Anything positive in the clip at all? I guess my stance and guard is pretty bad too.

I had another somewhat related question. What if anything to the fechtbuchs say about parrying with the pommel? I find myself doing that a lot in emergencies when wielding long swords, especially when wielding long swords single handed, where I find that I cant get the point down in time, but have a lot of handle to block with. It also comes up a lot with the big dopplehand swords. At first I thought of it as a sort of vice, but I've kind of grown to like it because it often puts you in an excellent counterattack position.

JR

[Casper Bradak]

As far as defending with the pommel I've never encountered a need for it much less advice on it.
If you're lucky or skilled enough to do it without losing your hand (you're putting it in great peril regardless) you'd quickly have a destroyed and unusable grip with real weapons.

[JeanryChandler]

Point well taken as far as difficulty and risk to the hand. I'm really mainly talking about this happening with certain weapons that have very long grips, primarily the "zweihander" or dopplehander, and I also have two long swords and a claymore which have pretty long grips. In the case of the dopplehander you have a handle or grip that is like 16 inches, just as safe to parry with as a lot of daggers, IMHO.

As for ruining the handle, well yeah possibly, though a grip could be replaced, I doubt the tang or the pommel itself (assuming it was metal) would be hugely damaged... in any event, I'd rather damage my grip and save my life than get cut.

As for having the skill, it seems to be something which has happened instinctively, I see the blow coming, realise I can't get the point where it needs to be in time, (this usually happens with the sword in a high middle guard or some kind of transition toward a middle guard after an attempted strike)
and I just drop the pommel down and catch the blow with it. The gauntlets I wear only protect my knuckles not my fingers (I don't like the loss of control with padding on the fingers) so I would feel it if my hand got tagged, and it hasn't yet when I've done this. It's just something I stumbled across so it's probably worthless.

Still, if the consensus is that it is indeed a vice, I'll try to supress it.

JR

[JeanryChandler]

I should point out, that I've only used this block successfully against strikes to my lower body / upper legs, the kind of strike i would usually try to stop with a hanging guard / point down parry or a beat before their blow has really started. If they outsmarted me and my blade is still in or near middle guard and I'm about to be hit, thats when I try the pommel - parry, if you will.

God, it sounds dumb though. "pommel parry" No truely worthwhile maneuver could sound that silly.

Maybe I really am stupid :0

[Lance Chan]

Hello. I am not sure if you are aware of this so if you are, please forgive me for bringing this out, which is blade alignment/edge placement.

I mention this because this is also related to "follow through". In order to cut with a real sword, you have to swing the sword at the angle where the edge is pointing at exactly. Hence producing the least impact area, the least friction and the largest pressure to penetrate the target's surface.

However, things don't stop here. You don't stop dead at the contact. You cut THROUGH it and get your sword out of it afterwards with a smooth motion. This is what follow through means.

Here I made you a small video of our sparring for comparison. You can notice that our cuts and thrusts were never intend to stop upon contact at all (no pulled blows).

(0.5mb)
http://lancelot.servehttp.com/hl.rm

[JeanryChandler]

Hi Lance,
Yes, thank you I am aware of cutting with the edge. My weapons do all have edge geometry and I do cut with the edge and attempt to block with the flat, for that matter.

I'm still not certain what ARMA and the fechtbuchs means by proper strikes and followthrough, at least when using padded weapons, but I am going to review my books and try to practice on the pell some this week.

As for pulling blows, it really depends who I'm sparring with. I only have a couple of friends who are really "hard core" into sparring, most in fact are just into it for fun. In these cases if I strike full force I get yelled at. Earlier this year we had LARP people showing up who would freak out if I hit them in the head! So I kind of work with whoever I have to spar with, I can usually get something out of it.

Unfortunately I only sometimes have access to the camera so I don't have much footage.

For some reason I am unable to play the RM clip you linked to. I don't suppose it would be possible to post a link in mpg format?

I had downloaded the clips from the recent ARMA event a while back and even studied them somewhat. I'll review them and pay close attention, and try to emulate the way y'all do cuts. On top of working on my footwork, that is <img src="http://www.thearma.org/forum/images/icons/tongue.gif" alt="" />

JR

[Lance Chan]

RM is real player format. It will be a smaller download than mpeg.

If you want mpeg format, wait a while.

[Lance Chan]

http://lancelot.servehttp.com/hl.mpg

About going "no pulled blows", I think the issue also involves your equipment's safety. Not everybody I spar with has martial arts background but they're fine with full body targetting and full contact. That's the reason they came after all. Maybe you can try to market it that way... "Want some real deal? HERE!"

[JeanryChandler]

Maybe my weapons are too hard? I have a range that I sell on Ebay, soft flimsy ones for the LARP people because thats what they want, but the ones I use for WMA are moderately hard and tight, and fairly heavy to be realistic... usually in the range of 2-3 pounds, and finally some for fencing schools which are flatter, even harder and stiffer and sometimes even heavier, maybe 3-4 pounds, depending on what they want.

These won't cause any permanent injury if you are wearing a helmet, other than the occasional bruise, but you do a bit of a thump when the blows are landing full-force.

I notice a sort of negative pavlovian reaction even with my standard weapons, especially when I'm going one on one with people who are either new or out of practice. If they are not only rarely landing any hits but they are being hit a lot and it's hurting them, they tend to lose interest quick. So I try to go a little easy on anyone who'se not comitted to the 'real deal'.

This has mixed results, as I have a few people interested in sparring for fun, but not enough and not enough who are serious. Organizing get togethers is a chore! Unforuntately I'm not in an ideal situation here, I'm not a member of a fencing school, not even ARMA due to some technical issues, so if I want to spar with other people I'm basicaly depending on old friends who I used to stick fight with back in the 80's who are willing to come around and spar some for fun. I do have a couple of friends with some serious interest but, like me they are old men in their 30's with families and careers ...schedules can be difficult to co-ordinate.

I keep trying though.

JR