Weapon crossover skills

[Victor]

To those of you who focus mostly on one weapon: Which primary weapon skills have proven to be most useful for crossing over to the other two? ... Are you more successful fencing saber/foil after epee, or saber/epee after foil, or epee/foil after saber?

[Grey]

Foil - Epee/Sabre

[CarlKnoch]

foil to epee and saber

[The0ne]

foil is the best beggining weapon, because it has within it parts of sabre and epee.

So I'd say foil -> Epee or Sabre

[Victor]

Hnh. I've seen foilists have problems adapting to the counter-attacks of epee, and I haven't yet seen a saber fencer who makes a good transition to either of the other two weapons without a lot of whacking. ... But epeeists seem to have a much better sense of distance and handle foils and sabers fairly well.

Or such is my experience.

[The0ne]

From what I've seen, epeeists have some trouble getting ROW for a while, until they remember that they're not fencing epee.

[D'Artagnan1673]

Then they go back to fencing epee and are parrying when they should counter attack.

[Craig]

From the perspective of understanding timing/tempo, sabre experience really helps in foil.

From general tactics foil helps you with epee.

For specific weapon control and target precision - each weapon is unique. (Epee trains you to default to the wrist, which hurts in foil as you tend to hit off target, Foil hurts your epee as your tendency is to go for the chest, and Sabre doesn't translate due to use of cuts.)

[walrus418]

My primary weapon is foil, but i occasionaly fence epee. I have found that i can bring all of my foil skills to bear, as long as i keep in mind the expanded target area that epee provides (on both offense and defense). I have also found that epeeists seem to have some difficulty with my tactics (especilly when i actually parry on occasion instead of counterattacking).

[Aeric]

A good mix of counterattacking and parrying in Epee tends to confuse the opponent, since die-hard Epee fencers expect you to counter or feint-counter all attacks.

[kalivor]

Well, coming from a foil background, I haven't found it too difficult when I pick up an epee or sabre -- doing the "right" things for those weapons doesn't take too much of an adjustment, and my occasional foil tactics often confuse my opponents.

On the flip side, I find that fencing sabre helps tremendously with my movement and timing in foil, and that fencing epee helps my tip-work (I have a tendency to get over-flicky at times).

On the other hand, one of the sabre fencers on my time has recently done fairly well fencing both epee and foil, and I faced an epee team from Belgium one year at the RMC Invitational who quite thoroughly convinced me that epee fencers can deal with priority and fence sabre quite well.

All in all, I think it's easier to switch from foil to the other two, for an unexperienced fencer. That way they can hit with the tip, and have a basic understanding of priority -- it's easier to drop one of the two than pick it up if you're not used to it.

For a more experienced fencer, they tend to understand the differences between the weapons and adapt fairly quickly (if not entirely) ... I don't think it matters much which weapon they're coming from or going to.

[glowstix]

definitely going from foil to any of the other weapons. foil tactics seem to work for me in epee but it does little for point control though.. that has to be developed through training in epee i suppose. also, the need for great point control in epee has helped in foil...i think each complements the other..but just keep me away from sabre!!!!

[whtouche]

As a sabre fencer I have found when fencing in the other two weapons(primarily foil) that my footwork gives me a huge advantage. Having fenced foil just a few times in my life I came in second out of 52 people in a 'U' tournament and earned my E. Total absence of blade until it was time to hit them.
I've also fenced in higher level foil competitions, and while my footwork can keep me alive longer, I ultimately lose because the bladework is so bizzare to me.

[dreadfoily]

I started with foil and then tried saber and epee. I like epee the most. I felt saber was too difficult a move for me from foil I have no idea why, I'm probably just built that way. [There may be some gender differences, with men having more upper body strength and IMHO more able to use the saber for head cuts and swing that arm into the bicep, which I can't do.]

[Peach]

Originally posted by dreadfoily
I started with foil and then tried saber and epee. I like epee the most. I felt saber was too difficult a move for me from foil I have no idea why, I'm probably just built that way. [There may be some gender differences, with men having more upper body strength and IMHO more able to use the saber for head cuts and swing that arm into the bicep, which I can't do.]

Uh . . . no. Anyone who uses upper body strength for their cuts is doing it wrong. Not to say that there aren't a few too many, male and female, who are doing it wrong. I'm curious about what you mean when you say "swing that arm into the bicep?" I don't use my bicep for my cuts. My head cut, just like my flank cut and my chest cut, are made with a simple extension and a squeeze of the fingers (in theory. I admit that my form is not ideal).

[Inquartata]

I agree with those who have mentioned sabre footwork and timing. These are highly advantageous at the least in foil, which is fenced much like sabre, footwork-wise, at high levels. On the few occasions when I have been dragooned into doing foil in a tournament over the years, I survived almost entirely on my ability to escape the usual brief, swiftly abandoned foil attacks by the simple expedient of retreating away from them...

As for epee, the whole of my strategy consists of using the guard like a tiny little shield---and footwork.

[counterattack]

Since other people have commented on their thoughts as to why the training and technique might share between weapons, I figured I'd add something else: numbers! (from BOD200310A.pdf on the usfencing site)

There are 0 fencers with an A in all three weapons
There is 1 fencer with Foil B Epee A Sabre A (wow! anybody know who this is?)

There are 7 fencers with Foil A Epee A

There are 2 fencers with Epee A Sabre A

There are 0 fencers with Foil A Sabre A

This might be skewed by the lack of Sabre As over all, since Sabre A competitions are hard to come by locally, and at nationals not so many people are interested in trying their hand at their second weapon.

Looking at the lower ratings, you have to ignore the bulge of ratings with the "99" year, since these seem to have come through the "you are automatically two ratings lower in the other weapons" rule that has since gone away. At least, that is how in interpret the bizarre uptick in ratings from that year. I think that perhaps only A and B are worth looking at, since who knows how many of the other ratings are decayed ratings from the "free three weapon rating" years.

There are 4 fencers with A or B in all three weapons

There are 61 fencers with A or B in both Foil and Epee

There are 14 fencers with A or B in both Foil and Sabre

There are 9 fencers with A or B in Epee and Sabre

Take into account the total number of A and B rated fencer in each weapon:

Sabre 243
Foil 564
Epee 397

From the numbers it seems that foil and epee help each other a good amount, but that there is little cross over between sabre and either of the other two weapons. Of course, there are plenty of other things that affect the numbers, but it seems like a pretty strong correlation to me.

I, of course, don't think this ends the discussion, I just wanted to add some data for everyone to see.

[D'Artagnan1673]

counter attack,

I looked for 15 minutes and couldn't find that .pdf. I even ran all sorts of searches. Could you send a link?

[Tireur]

There are 4 fencers with A or B in all three weapons

Very interesting. Where did you find this? I never knew I was in such an exclusive club.

[counterattack]

Originally posted by D'Artagnan1673
counter attack,

I looked for 15 minutes and couldn't find that .pdf. I even ran all sorts of searches. Could you send a link?

http://www.usfencing.org/Official/BOD200310A.pdf

Start at the back, since the stats are over the last 10-20 pages. If you like numbers (I do) you may be entertained for hours (I was)