Losing Foil Popularity?

[The0ne]

heh, Fag the Hutt Finder, I thought you were from Boston. . .

[akaiyuki]

My school team:
all foilists (because we are too poor to afford other equipments)
But a couple of us fence other weapons in clubs :P, still, there are wayyy more foilists in my area o.O

[DJ Flow]

To go ahead and pile on, I don't know what the hell club you're at, but most places of any size are All Foil, All The Time. The University of Texas FC was almost exclusively foil (this with ~20 members) until our latest (and greatest) coach arrived four years ago; as our numbers have grown, we've gotten considerably more diverse. Seriously though, where are you that your club can seriously consider eliminating foil?

[Grey]

Flick are for inadequete sissys with no point control and insanely flexible blades purchased for that sole purpose. The art of the thrust and disengage are far more noble.

"regardless of whatever disservice it does to the roots of the sport"

I'll have to disagree with this statement. History makes us as we are. It seems to be as if we must dismiss our "ancients" and "creators" in order to advance? Sounds wrong imo.

[DJ Flow]

The flick is foil's sole redeeming feature! If you wanted to fence like a man, why wouldn't you just fence saber?

[Artisan]

I realize, TheOne, that fencing is a sport separate from combat. But it is still derived from combat, and should therefore try to at least stay somewhat true to it.

Not really though... Fencing evolved from dueling, which if compaired to combat, is a highly ritualized version of it - far far removed from combat's objective of "killing at any cost" Fencing is now a game- a sport - why should it remain true to a historical ideal? Evoloution is a fundamentally normal process, not just in biology but in human institutions as well.

If you want to play the game at its roots...fence epee, much closer to a "combat" ideal.

[grphiw]

Not really though... Fencing evolved from dueling, which if compaired to combat, is a highly ritualized version of it - far far removed from combat's objective of "killing at any cost" Fencing is now a game- a sport - why should it remain true to a historical ideal? Evoloution is a fundamentally normal process, not just in biology but in human institutions as well.

If you want to play the game at its roots...fence epee, much closer to a "combat" ideal.

Well, everybody has a slightly different spin on the history of fencing. Generally, though, most of fencing came from dueling. Foil originally was a training weapon for military engagements, and later as it became less and less used, a form of sport. That's when all the concepts of flicks and other fleshwound-causing techniques were developed. Epee, on the other hand, was the original dueling weapon, coming from the rapier. It was first used as a one point bout weapon, first to draw blood, double defeats allowed. These were usually over manners of honor. Of course, all three weapons could have been used for dueling, just epee has its roots in it.

[grphiw]

my college's team:
- Foilists: 4
- Epeeists: 2
- Sabreurs: 1

but then the other non military club on the city is more like 20% foil, 70% epee, 10% sabre.

the military clubs are sabre mainly, except for the navy that are mostly epeeists.

i think it's more about the coach of every club.

Interesting. My club has the exact opposite. We're overflowing with sabres, short on foils. As the reason for my original post.

[Inquartata]

Whoof! Send some of 'em to us!