Written by Coach Greg Jones, Rain City Fencing Center
Monday, 30 August 2004
The difficulty of teaching preparations is that they involve compound footwork and a complex combination of technique and tactics. By technique I mean the correct execution of a series of physical actions, for example a balestra which lands balanced or an advance-lunge which flows smoothly and accelerates. By tactics I mean a series of actions which, interacting with the opponent, bring about the ultimate in fencing, namely a one-tempo situation.
The object of the game is to use footwork and distance control to be able to hit your opponent in the chest with the glove with an advance-lunge attack. While it uses the chest as the main target, this game is good for all 3 weapons as it teaches distance as well as tempo and direction changes.
There have been several discussions on the rec.sport.fencing newsgroup and in the fencing.net forums on the different types of exercises one should do in order to be in the best shape for fencing.
I thought I would take a different tack and suggest some footwork exercises that I have used in the past. These come from drills that the team at UNC-Chapel Hill did on a regular basis and are taken from the Olympic Footwork Exercises our national teams have used.
