keeping hold of the weapon

[morael]

We all know that not to "throttle" the grip, "choke," take a "death grip" etc. The problem I run into is the opponent who swats my blade as hard as he can. Unless I hold on just about as hard as I can, I lose control and even drop the weapon. This bites technique-wise, and I have to shake my hand out at every chance. Surely there's another way! Help!

[Inquartata]

Evade the beat?

[glowstix]

lose the french grip then. if you have a pistol grip you can grip as lightly as you want and they can't get it out of there. also try and avoid the attacks on the blade using evasion; perhaps try keeping the blade down some of the time.

[FoilyGeezer]

This is one of my personal pet peeves. I firmly believe that you shouldn't engage your opponents blade unless you intend to do something. Usually if an opponent whacks my blade I watch for them to do it again and then disengage and hit them in the chest. Heh.

You can also just hold your weapon loosely and let your opponent knock your blade around. If you just relax, it won't get knocked out of your hand.

If you don't like getting your blade knocked around just evade his beats. Good practice anyway.

[suregrip]

My son uses a french grip and he holds it lightly. Maybe it comes with experience, but he tells me that he can 'see' his opponent set up a beat-attack, and merely disengages using a "V" around it. That leaves his opponents arm and blade way out in left (or right) field, scrambling like crazy to come back in line, but by that time, my son has neatly lunged and scored to an unprotected target.

I don't fence foil, but I watched my son do this against a particular kid who loved to beat the blade hard, then attack. It looked like the kid was swatting flies while he was being picked off. Hope this helps.

[glowstix]

Originally Posted by FoilyGeezer

Usually if an opponent whacks my blade I watch for them to do it again and then disengage and hit them in the chest. Heh.

perfect..i do that too. personally i love when someone does horrible beat attacks (with the entire arm, thus leaving them wide open). so easy to beat.
usually i fleche just when they get open and by the time they try to recover the blade, i would have already scored and fleched past them.

[Rolls]

I used the French grip for a long time. I also had the problem of getting my weapon knocked around (or out of my hand).

I have two suggestions:

1) Fence from absence of blade (some people prefer to call it a low on guard). You will have to adjust your fencing some (usually distance need to be larger), but with your weapon held low, if someone tries to beat it, you can just attack them because they will be obviously searching far from your target area.

2) If you do get hit hard and feel like you're going to loose your weapon, then let it go. Action stops when you weapon hits the ground (or maybe it's a tempo after you loose the weapon). It's better to just drop it, hold your hand up so the referee knows your not holding you weapon, and finally get WAY away from your opponent. As long as you keep good distance, your opponent will not have a chance to hit you after knocking your weapon loose. Either way it's better to drop it and focus on getting away than to focus on keeping your weapon up while you barely have a hold of it. You're definitely going to get hit if you have a half way grip on you're weapon. You have a good chance of getting away if you forget the weapon and focusing on getting away.

Rolls.

[Louweasel]

Similar to what has been said already, but when I was fencing a guy at my club who does a lot of hard beat attacks (and he hits with the side a lot as he's just started sabre, and he tries to flick but can't...but that's another rant...) a more experienced fencer just advised me to move my blade out of the way as often as possible. Even if you can't always get round and hit them, just stopping them from making contact a few times tends to p!ss this sort of person off - they might even stop doing it.

[acaba]

You can also try changing the angle of your weapon. Raise or lower either your tip or guard. The way to make a hard beat is to get angle between the blades. If you hold your blade parallel to your opponents, he/she cannot make the hard beat.

Look at two fencers from the side. If the blades meet and look like an 'X', the beat will succeed, but if the blades are parallel, your opponent won't be able to get purchase on your blade. This may also make it easier to disengage the beat, since you don't have to move your blade as much.

[veeco]

There is a difference between not having a death grip, and holding the weapon firmly in place.

Regardless of what type of grip you are using, what you need to do is find the right balance between the two. It's OK to hold your weapon a little tighter when you are doing actions on the blade, or when receiving such actions, what you need to do is find out when to firm up your grip and when to loosen it. It can take time to figure out.

[damianip]

Inq is right (OMG we agree!!!!)

Evasion is the key. I've been using a French grip in epee for about four years now. I've been disarmed once.

What Veeco says is very true. Deciding when to tighten the grip and when to relax is important. However, I tend to err on the side of tightness, and it costs me touches over time by causing me to tighten the entire arm and shoulder. My coach has been trying to correct this for over a year.

Resisting an extremely strong beat does little good. Do what Foilygeezer suggests and take advantage of it.

It's not a hardware problem, it's a software problem.

Paolo

BTW, I believe that losing your weapon during a simple action by your opponent won't save you.

[Rolls]

BTW, I believe that losing your weapon during a simple action by your opponent won't save you.

I'd argue that if you're going to get hit on a simple action; you're going to get hit regardless of whether or not you lose your weapon. I just think if you get to the point where you're struggling to hold onto your weapon. Stop struggling. Let it go. You don't need your weapon to prevent yourself from getting hit anyway.

If you watch the Golubitsky Golden Bouts DVD, you will see him loose his weapon a couple of times (I think towards the end of the bout with Kim Yung). It pretty much looks like he's just letting go because at that point he knew he couldn't get the parry and dropping the weapon wouldn't hurt.

Alot of people will tell you to avoid the beat by disengaging... Well, I have never fenced a person who I couldn't beat their weapon. Granted, a lot of times I may not want to beat their weapon. Anyone who thinks they can derobe or disengage every beat is deluding themselves.

The best scenario is to avoid getting hit, but if you're having trouble holding onto the weapon, you need to be prepared for when you do get hit hard on the weapon and loose your grip. Drop it and get away. Of course, you shouldn't drop your weapon anytime blade contact occurs. Just when it is so jarring that you have a difficult time holding on. But be prepared many fencers will attack as soon as your weapon leaves your hand (some might have been preparing to attack anyway). If you know that the weapon isn't in your hand, it should make retreating out of distance easier.

Rolls.

[MikeHarm]

here is what my approach is:

First off, you can just move your foil out of line. Have a guard where its not out there to get beat on.

Second, when beating the blade the weapon inscribes the shape of a cone in the air. The weakest point of a cone is the center. If you keep your blade at the center of the cone the beat attacks are inscribing you can evade with small motions and then just peg your opponent as the attacks miss your blade.

When they do beat attacks, learn to use the energy of their beat to come around into circle parries. When they bind your blade, use yielding parries to come around and counter the attack on your blade.

Also, the most important thing I learned is to keep your arm loose. If you tighten the muscles in your wrist and arm every attack on your blade will have a much much greater effect.

[grphiw]

There are a lot of good pieces of advice, but here's one just to make it easier to transition into them.

Pretend your holding a bird you like . You don't want to let it go and fly away, yet you don't want to make a puree out of it. Hold it like that if it really struggled, your hands would give but not let go. Yet if it sat there, it wouldn't fall out. I found this works well in the beggining.

[silentoutcry]

lol grphiw did you read the steps to success: Fencing book? It has what you said almost word for word in like chapter two i believe.

[veeco]

Originally Posted by Rolls

Alot of people will tell you to avoid the beat by disengaging... Well, I have never fenced a person who I couldn't beat their weapon. Granted, a lot of times I may not want to beat their weapon. Anyone who thinks they can derobe or disengage every beat is deluding themselves.

I disagree. I think that it is possible to disengage every beat from someone. I remember clearly fencing someone in my previous club and at the end of the 15 touch bout, the guy had not touched my weapon. And while I don't know if he was specifically trying to beat or push my blade away, I can assure you that he was getting quite mad at the end. There is a way to disengage that makes it very hard for the beater to make an effective beat. If you are trying to beat someone's weapon who doesn't know how to disengage well, then you will get the beat everytime. Once you start doing this to someone who knows how to disengage well, that's another story. Especially if the other person is actually playing with your mind and can get you to beat in a certain way or in a certain line.

The best scenario is to avoid getting hit, but if you're having trouble holding onto the weapon, you need to be prepared for when you do get hit hard on the weapon and loose your grip. Drop it and get away. Of course, you shouldn't drop your weapon anytime blade contact occurs. Just when it is so jarring that you have a difficult time holding on. But be prepared many fencers will attack as soon as your weapon leaves your hand (some might have been preparing to attack anyway). If you know that the weapon isn't in your hand, it should make retreating out of distance easier.

I am not sure this is good advice: you're basically saying to the person to not try and evade every beat, and when they get beat too hard, to let go of the weapon and run away? How are they supposed to score this way? I think that better advice would be that when you are fencing lower level fencers, the stronger the beat is, the more likely it is that it has been executed poorly, thus making it easy to disengage around. Try and predict the strong beats, and time it so that when you see your opponents blade winding up to beat your blade, hold your weapon a little tigher and use your fingers to neatly disengage. Just drop your point when your opponents blade arrives and before they make contact, and put it back up once the opponent's blade is passed. You will have a prime target in front of you and all you will need to do is to extend to score.

[FoilyGeezer]

Originally Posted by Rolls

Anyone who thinks they can derobe or disengage every beat is deluding themselves.

Remember, we're talking about strong, heavy beats here.

Most heavy beaters telegraph the beat. There's a raising of the shoulder that gives it away. It's very difficult to put a beat on your opponents blade strong enough to disarm them without beating (at least partially) downward. I like to give them a good target and then just watch the elbow or the shoulder as they begin moving the hand diagonally down to pick up my blade I drop my hand slightly and disengage around the hand as the blade comes through. Momemtum will keep that hand moving away from your blade. The rest is obvious.

I love beat attacks. It's one of my most effective attacks. When executed properly with good timing, it's hard to stop. Most people do it improperly though. They think beat; then attack. In a good beat attack, the beat is executed on the way toward the target, not before going toward the target. It is ideally small and crisply delivered on the foible of your opponents blade just below the tape and is executed on the way in during the attack not before the attack. A beat delivered in this manner takes only a millisecond or two longer than a straight lunge, and moves your opponents blade aside enough to land the attack. A beat like that won't knock the weapon out of your opponents hand, isn't telegraphed since it's mostly a small wrist action on the same line as a lunge, and is difficult to gain advantage on, since you're already attacking, any derobement doesn't release the opponent from being obligated to parry the attack (whether you beat his blade or not, if you do it right it'll still look like a direct lunge).

[Rolls]

I am not sure this is good advice: you're basically saying to the person to not try and evade every beat, and when they get beat too hard, to let go of the weapon and run away?

Maybe I was not completely clear. I'm saying, yes, try to avoid the beat. That's an obvious one (fencing with your weapon held low \ \ vs / \ will avoid 75% of beats). But I'm saying that you are going to have you're weapon hit. Even if you avoid every beat, eventually you will attack and be parried (which sometimes can be just as jarring as a beat). I'm sure this guy isn't loosing his weapon on every exchange. It probably happens when he's caught by surprise, or is facing a very aggressive opponent, etc. I just think that if you feel the weapon leaving your hand, instead of standing there and trying to keep hold of it, pick it up, chase after the weapon, you could try leaving it and getting out of the way.

Besides if you can avoid blade contact for an entire bout, then 1) you're way better than your opponent, or 2) you're just standing there. If this guy could avoid every beat, he probably wouldn't be here asking for help.

Rolls.

[morael]

Thanks. What a great diversity of great advice. Hugely helpful. Makes me realize how much I have to work on, especially anticipating the opponent and increasing finger/hand/wrist skill, and keeping shoulders and neck relaxed. (Interesting how these things also help avoid injury and stiffness.)

Like any proper nemesis, these strong-arm opponents force me to remember overall motivation and mindset (why I fence), so as not to get angry or flustered.

[veeco]

Originally Posted by Rolls

Maybe I was not completely clear.... I just think that if you feel the weapon leaving your hand, instead of standing there and trying to keep hold of it, pick it up, chase after the weapon, you could try leaving it and getting out of the way.

Thanks for clarifying. That makes more sense... I am sure everyone else understood it correctly the first time and that I had not, but I wanted to make sure

Besides if you can avoid blade contact for an entire bout, then 1) you're way better than your opponent, or 2) you're just standing there. If this guy could avoid every beat, he probably wouldn't be here asking for help.

True, if he was, he/she wouldn't be asking for help, however, I think that he might have been either asking for advice on how to deal with fencers who have strong beats, referring to how to hold his weapon, as well as just advice on how to hold the weapon properly. Sometimes a problem like this (I am getting disarmed) can be a symptom for 2 things:

1- Not holding the weapon correctly
2- Not knowing how/when to disengage effectively.

I was trying to address both problems at the same time, since it is hard to find out which is the problem he/she is having without seeing it first hand.

Besides, I think that you don't necessarily have to be much better than someone to avoid his beats/blade. The person I was referring to was actually a B rated epeeist, and I was a A at the time, so on paper the difference in skill level wasn't that big.