Olympic Wrap Up Article

[achilleus]

I'm so disappointed. The article was great, but when I read the summary which talked about the future of fencing I thought we were going to get analysis of the current trends in styles and actions.

I know a previous thread talked titled observations of the Olympics touched on them, but it was short.

I mean, I watched the men's team foil, and was shocked about a couple of things. I mean, the game was certainly different than a year ago...

For the most part of what I saw, less overall movement, closer distance, less flicks, more reliance on attacks in prep, and the classic parry 4 straight riposte has reemerged.

Is this unique to the couple of bouts I saw? Or is this a trend that fencers are moving toward point attacks and distance more?

Women's foil has certainly changed in the past few years. Lot's of movement, prep, and dynamic fast attacks, but very little rushing. They take their time to set up some well thought out actions...

How about the other observations and weapons?

[wflaschka]

Originally Posted by achilleus

I'm so disappointed. The article was great, but when I read the summary which talked about the future of fencing I thought we were going to get analysis of the current trends in styles and actions.

I would've loved to have gone into detail about the technique and actions... alas, my time is short, there were deadlines... and I didn't really see the fencing enough to get a good idea of what's changed. I have a few minutes on Tivo, but for the rest -- I had a hit-or-miss connection on the RAI feed and no way to replay the video. I got to see a lot of fencing, but I couldn't stew in it. I figure this tactical stuff is very open to discussion anyway.

Here's my take... too late for the article...

Much of the fencing looked like a close relation to the 2003 World Champs. For sabre, the USA squad mixed things up... it doesn't seem possible for USA's opponents to pull enough distance and let the attack fail. In 2003, there was a lot of was jumping back, willy nilly, into the air, to make the opponents' attacks fall short -- and then deliver a counter-attack that would hit. A sort of reverse tschuszlatar (sp!?). I saw an attack on Covaliu miss -- he left his arm out but twisted it so the attack went between his arm and body, and then cut hand. It's nothing groundbreaking, except that (to me) it's exceptional for sabre fencers to let go of their form like this. They usually stay very tight and controlled, so to be able to utilize reflexive parries and stop-cuts. Smart and Lee seem to love chasing the opponents down, they seem happiest when they've crossed the whole strip. Pulling distance wasn't working against them -- so their opponents (I saw Podzniakov and Touya mainly) opted to double-out and use a (perhaps finer) sense of tempo to squeak out priority.

In Women's sabre, USA is setting the pace for footwork. Sada Jacobson will pull distance but maintain composure, and when she turns the corner after retreating from an attack, she's as put-together as when the action started. You can tell the Jacobsons' emphasis on form -- they get en garde, and freeze there, long before the director says "fence." In a lot of ways, sabre is like baseball, where you define your game, put it up against opponents, and then "live in the now" and grok the zen of it.

Sabrists have a good feeling when they're going to attack, and when they're going to retreat, before the action starts. Clarified actions like attack parry-riposte are more probabilistic than in other weapons -- the attacker's and defender's pre-chosen actions must "line up," and Sada in particular seems very good at predictive fencing (she won the 2004 Div1a Nats with parry-3 riposte, and scored a few during her bronze match). Zagunis is a fighter, but Sada Jacobson is the one to watch for where women's sabre is going.

In sabre, the "new" game will be to predict those clear actions and make them. If the fallback strategy is to merely double-out -- well, the results are dissatisfying. It's a sort of fight-by-attrition. Every fencer saw Smart get edged out in the team competition twice, and Lee got slowly picked apart by Pozdniakov in individuals. The fencers and coaches will be wanting to take back more control of the action from the director -- so the director doesn't assign touches based on fine shavings of tempo (e.g., randomly).

Team USA's attacks show that it won't be easy for defenders to make attacks fall short... and if doubling-out is not an option, then look for a re-emphasis on hand technique. I know where elite lessons focus -- distance, distance, distance. It's hard work; it will get harder now that virtuosic handwork is a requirement. I'd even say that some of our coaches will grow in importance, and some will shrink -- a good distance coach is not necessarily a good hand coach. Besides, an excellent hand can mean you don't have to worry about precision tempo as much -- with a hand, it's not how you start the action, it's how you finish it. Montano running away from Nemscik had nothing, so he made a hand solution with an awesome feint in time for his 2nd-to-last touch (the one people called the line).

In foil... someday I'm going to feel solid enough to talk about the Italian game. I think it's fascinating. It's what's going on right now. They have two games -- men's and women's. The women are tight, favor short actions, a simplified library of moves... and a sort of dark intensity... but they're aging out of competition. Their replacements may look like the men (hopefully) unless there's a genius Italian maestro making all their women.

The men are cheerful, improvisational, and have truly whacky tempo that can confuse opponents and directors alike. Many non-Italian fencers can be strong and decisive, but their actions look like reflexive mouse-traps (oh, you're doing this? click whap! Got ya). The Italian method is more zen; structurally it's like water running down hill through some rocks -- it splatters everywhere but covers everything. In some world cup video, I saw an Italian take away the tempo from a Bissdorf simple advance lunge. You have to have galactic skills, and the ego of an opera singer, to make that happen.

The box-timing changes will clamp down on some of this improvisational stuff -- fencers will need more planning/time to get the tip around in time. In the short term, I see the French and Russians (and old eastern bloc) seeing immediate gains for their styles. But the Italians are already working towards strong hits (and the Germans, too). An example is Sanzo charges forward, hand high, threatening a flick to the back -- but changes at the last minute for a downward point-strike under the defender's block (against Joppich in 2003 World Champs?). Those hits probably hurt because there's no place for the blade to bend, but it will set off the stickiest tip.

A while ago I wrote an article called "Future of Foil" about the box-timing changes. I still think I'm pretty on target, and since then I've been working out the hand technique for this new kung fu. The hand technique is actually old technique, but we've gotten sloppy because we can drag the tip on the target and still get a point. The handwork places a premium on the fixed wrist, and strong, decisive hits. In the middle of an action, the fencer will be able to make the most definitive moves after the opponent has committed to an attack.

These committed attacks will come earlier (see the article), so the fencer will have the opportunity to: coulé, bind, close-out. Offensive/defensive single-actions that happen when you know where the opponent's blade is, and have some tension to push against. Examples -- Vezzali did a nice close-out on Gruchala in the 2003 World Champs; I saw the Germany's Wessels do this a lot and I associate him with 2nd-intention way of killing a Point in Line. These actions work best with a good hand -- and I haven't seen many Americans with that sort of hand.

Hand technical coaches will be very useful in the future, and we should THROW OUT all those how-to books that show fencers with a broken wrist position. The rule of thumb hand position is (via a french handle) the pommel never leaves the wrist. Blade actions will be -- I hate to say it -- a little more epee-y, but with back-and-forth Right of Way foil goodness.

The footwork doesn't need re-imagining -- it's sabre in a broth of epee. It will probably start looking long and pretty, like the Polish women's foil squad. Right now we're locally (USA) seeing a lot of upright fencers charging forward and bumping chests -- in expectation that the opponent will close distance. Closing distance won't be as useful, so fencers will "open out" and keep the opponents in front of them -- more Romankovy. To quote David Littell -- "Big as a house." In men's team foil, the USA squad much too often charged forward onto the tip. USA was thinking "hit from behind", Russia was thinking "keep them in front."

For Epee... too complex for me right now! I didn't see enough of the action. Watch the French, I'm thinking.

Woo I feel better! And that was a lot easier to write than something that had to be supported by evidence!

[reposte]

The Italians lost to a French and a Russian at the individual finals, they yought to have lost atthe teams from the little I've seen.

When the new timings will be introduced, how many of you think that Cassara will recover?

How good will the Italians be then?

It's the Twilight of the Gods if you ask me for the Italians.

[sabreur]

Originally Posted by wflaschka

Sabrists have a good feeling when they're going to attack, and when they're going to retreat, before the action starts. Clarified actions like attack parry-riposte are more probabilistic than in other weapons -- the attacker's and defender's pre-chosen actions must "line up," and Sada in particular seems very good at predictive fencing (she won the 2004 Div1a Nats with parry-3 riposte, and scored a few during her bronze match). Zagunis is a fighter, but Sada Jacobson is the one to watch for where women's sabre is going.

In sabre, the "new" game will be to predict those clear actions and make them. If the fallback strategy is to merely double-out -- well, the results are dissatisfying. It's a sort of fight-by-attrition. Every fencer saw Smart get edged out in the team competition twice, and Lee got slowly picked apart by Pozdniakov in individuals. The fencers and coaches will be wanting to take back more control of the action from the director -- so the director doesn't assign touches based on fine shavings of tempo (e.g., randomly).

Team USA's attacks show that it won't be easy for defenders to make attacks fall short... and if doubling-out is not an option, then look for a re-emphasis on hand technique. I know where elite lessons focus -- distance, distance, distance. It's hard work; it will get harder now that virtuosic handwork is a requirement. I'd even say that some of our coaches will grow in importance, and some will shrink -- a good distance coach is not necessarily a good hand coach. Besides, an excellent hand can mean you don't have to worry about precision tempo as much -- with a hand, it's not how you start the action, it's how you finish it. Montano running away from Nemscik had nothing, so he made a hand solution with an awesome feint in time for his 2nd-to-last touch (the one people called the line).

Walter,

A couple of points.

1. The rock-paper-scissors thing is wrong. Both of my masters teach/emphasize/beat into my head: preparation-assessment-action. The good guys do the same thing--they are not guessing probabilities. They are watching their opponents in preparation, and acting based on their observations. It is hard for mere mortals to believe, but it is true. Sometimes your assessment is wrong, but that is different from "guessing." I think it is very dangerous to perpetuate the rock-paper-scissors approach, especially with junior fencers--it may appear to be true at some levels, but it will seriously stunt your game as you move higher.

2. You rarely go into a simultaneous with the intent of getting a simultaneous; you generally go in with the intent of stealing time, with the alternative action being a step back/parry-riposte (preferably parry with distance). Podz didn't "slowly" pick Keeth apart--he dismembered him--look at how many actions were called simultaneous versus how many were called for Podz. When you consider that he was starting with five point deficit in a ten point bout, it is amazing the number of touches he racked up on close to simultaneous attacks--and how consistently he won these touches. It was not a fall-back strategy, he knew he had the footwork to beat Keeth to the punch, he set up the points to result in the right situation, and mercilessly exploited it.

3. As much as I would like there to be more blade play and hand work, I just don't see it happening, especially not for the men. The constraints are the speed of the athletes and the limits of human reaction time. Quite simply, in modern men's sabre, even a jumped-up cat wouldn't have the time to react to attacks and successfully parry consistently enough to make the risk of a mal-pare worth the game. There were significantly more parries in the women's matches--I think that's because they don't move quite as fast. The one thing that might change this would be if it became easier to establish a line--that might slow the footwork down and make parries less risky--but I doubt it.

4. Finally, it is vital to remember that sabre is a very complex and sophisticated game--I know this is often hard for foilists and epeeists to comprehend, but it is nonetheless true--there is no "simple solution" in sabre. A good sabreur has a game based on complex and precise footwork, exceptional time, a good hand and the ability to perceive, process and act very quickly. There is often a "flavor of the week" action--distance parry, seconde parry, etc., but the good guys work out a solution pretty quickly, and the flavor of the week goes back to just being another tool in the kit.

Cheers, MR

[dunastor]

Excellent post sabreur, you're my hero...

*goes and hangs post above bed...*

[Inquartata]

Awesome precis, sabreur.

With regard to #3, though, I think the craftier sabre fencers often do go simultaneous deliberately---to set up a pattern, which they will then break to their advantage with a planned ruse of some sort...

[sabreur]

Originally Posted by Inquartata

Awesome precis, sabreur.

With regard to #3, though, I think the craftier sabre fencers often do go simultaneous deliberately---to set up a pattern, which they will then break to their advantage with a planned ruse of some sort...

Yes, but they are still hoping to steal time--they expect the simultaneous and are using it to set up a follow-up action, but it isn't a throw-away action--if they can get that extra bit of time, they'll take it...

Thanks....

MR

[Inquartata]

Not always, though. Or rather, not always with a "but".

For instance, when an opponent begins an attack as soon as the ref says "Fe---", I will sometimes deliberately go simultaneous, not aiming for anything else but the double. Then I'll do it again. This establishes the pattern, and he expects me to do it again. So I know what he's going to do, but he only thinks he knows what I'm going to do; and I do something else, like steal time or fade immediately and stop-cut, or what have you. When he figures this out, I may change it up after the second double, because now he's expecting it on the third iteration. And so forth. But at least some of the doubles are deliberate, as preliminary groundwork, so to speak.

Needless to say, it doesn't always work out as planned. But then, nothing does.

[wflaschka]

Sabreur, thanks for your reply!! I made a thesis, now there's an anti-thesis. I think the truth is somewhere between. I also think these discussions are so much more fulfilling and elevating to fencing than, "He was without honour, sir! Let me enumerate the ways he was dishonourable."

1. The rock-paper-scissors thing is wrong. Both of my masters teach/emphasize/beat into my head: preparation-assessment-action. The good guys do the same thing--they are not guessing probabilities. They are watching their opponents in preparation, and acting based on their observations. It is hard for mere mortals to believe, but it is true. Sometimes your assessment is wrong, but that is different from "guessing." I think it is very dangerous to perpetuate the rock-paper-scissors approach, especially with junior fencers--it may appear to be true at some levels, but it will seriously stunt your game as you move higher.

My description of essential sabre tactics may have been simple, but this is a simplification of my simplification (for example, I never called it "rock-paper-scissors").

The "have an idea what you're going to do" concept is necessary and integral, because as we saw, sabre actions don't have to be long enough to require/allow tactical adaptation to changing situations. If your opponent doesn't want to let you play your long game, they have the option of just closing distance quickly and doubling out. It's not just me saying it. Have an idea what you're going to do at a given point and location -- from a French-trained sabre coach I work with. Work strategies based on what the opponent likes to do (probabilism) -- from a Sada Jacobson quote. Have an immediate plan before the "fence" -- from a bunch of Csaba-derived sabrists and from watching the developing Westbrook fencers, long ago.

One of the toughest things for a young sabre fencer to learn is decisiveness. Decisiveness is important, i.e., Nemscik lost due to lack of decisiveness (he was trying to think too much inside the action). If you see our youngest, newest, or most isolated sabrists, they fence it like foil. Advance, swipe, stop. Retreat, advance. Stop. Double-retreat. Lunge+swipe. "Did my attack get through the parry?" It's not only that they don't see enough high-level sabre (in person or on video), they also don't have the proper approach to the actions. Compare to higher-level sabre, where the fencers have a near-complete idea of what they're going to do at the beginning... and they also have a plan in place for different situations and different locations of the strip. There is no guessing as such, and it would only be like Rock-Paper-Scissors if Rock-Paper-Scissors allowed the players to run back and forth and change their selection up until the two players closed distance.

If it was truly easy for us mortals to work flexibly and adaptively at the speed of sabre, we would be seeing more than 1 or 2 parry ripostes in a 15 touch bout. You don't have to think too hard to make a strong marching attack, and you only need to think when you're doubling-out (instead, feel). Don't worry -- nobody believes there's something super-human about sabre. Shucks, sabreurs don't even have to worry about whether everything is set up so they'll hit with the tip (which is a layer of complexity layed over every single foil/epee action).

2. You rarely go into a simultaneous with the intent of getting a simultaneous; you generally go in with the intent of stealing time, with the alternative action being a step back/parry-riposte (preferably parry with distance). Podz didn't "slowly" pick Keeth apart--he dismembered him--look at how many actions were called simultaneous versus how many were called for Podz. When you consider that he was starting with five point deficit in a ten point bout, it is amazing the number of touches he racked up on close to simultaneous attacks--and how consistently he won these touches. It was not a fall-back strategy, he knew he had the footwork to beat Keeth to the punch, he set up the points to result in the right situation, and mercilessly exploited it.

The goal of doubling-out is to find that thing which will give you the point, if not in the current action, then the one after. Simultaneous is merely a common result of doubling out, as both fencers fail to intuit the tempo or bladework they needed. Pozdniakov was not going to retreat before Smart, and give Smart a chance to use his long attacks, even though it would have opened up the bout and given Pozd a bigger window to score. I think also Pozdniakov didn't want to play an athletic game at that point. So we're in agreement about how Pozdniakov won the doubling-out contest, but maybe not why Pozdniakov chose to do it that way. It doesn't take a genius to think, "I'm gonna get killed if I retreat, so I'll go forward for Every. Single. Action."

Looking at the bouts against team USA, most opponents thought that way. Why? As the tapes show, Smart and Lee can score easily with strong marching attacks. So the bouts against team USA have a different nature than, say, the Montano vs Nemscik bout. In sabre, game #1 is scoring clear touches, game #2 is doubling-out and letting the director score the touches based on tempo esoterica.

3. As much as I would like there to be more blade play and hand work, I just don't see it happening, especially not for the men. The constraints are the speed of the athletes and the limits of human reaction time. Quite simply, in modern men's sabre, even a jumped-up cat wouldn't have the time to react to attacks and successfully parry consistently enough to make the risk of a mal-pare worth the game. There were significantly more parries in the women's matches--I think that's because they don't move quite as fast. The one thing that might change this would be if it became easier to establish a line--that might slow the footwork down and make parries less risky--but I doubt it.

Because of #3, see #1. I agree that sabre is fast, and I think this is the reason why sabrists think out their actions beforehand. You seem to be saying, (#1) it's not assess-and-act but assess-while-acting, and (#3) it's too fast to really assess-while-acting.

I think it's assess-and-act, and moreover, I see the opportunity for a bigger role with the hand. What moves faster than a sabrist? A sabrist's hand. Since a hand motion can nullify a thousand calories worth of footwork, it's only a matter of time before a transcendent hand fencer starts channeling Lamour (or somebody) and changes the face of sabre. (In foil, we get a super-genius every decade who levels off the sharp spikes in the tactical line-graph, and "resets" the game.)

When sabre fencers don't use bladework at the Olympics, I don't think it's due to sabre's nature or that sabre fencers are incapable of blade work. It's just that these fencers aren't using the hand, for the current game, or against a given opponent. The Pozdniakov-Smart men's team match was screaming for a parry riposte. The next time a match like that happens, the fencer who realizes, "parry riposte," and can make it happen, is going to win. It's the next plausible step after tempo is maxed out as a tactic.

4. Finally, it is vital to remember that sabre is a very complex and sophisticated game--I know this is often hard for foilists and epeeists to comprehend, but it is nonetheless true--there is no "simple solution" in sabre. A good sabreur has a game based on complex and precise footwork, exceptional time, a good hand and the ability to perceive, process and act very quickly. There is often a "flavor of the week" action--distance parry, seconde parry, etc., but the good guys work out a solution pretty quickly, and the flavor of the week goes back to just being another tool in the kit.

No argument. Foil wouldn't steal so much from sabre if sabre wasn't the place to be. What sabre needs to remember is that it's not always complex and sophisticated. It's also a game where you can win by never retreating, never searching for or meeting the opponent's blade, and you can turn a light on by closing your eyes and swinging.

Starting with that foundation, it's the fencer who can add complexity (distance, then tempo, then hand) who will be successful. Anyhow, it's all cyclical -- when I talk about sabre hand, it's just that the wheel is going to roll over eventually. Sabre is not going to look like this forever.

[sabreman]

Russian (Soviet) game is based on the attack. They know that the attacking fencer will score ~ 80% of the time. Also it is important not to go to fast with the feet.

[sabreur]

Walter,

This could go on forever, but I'll try to keep it short.

I think you are seriously underestimating the difficulty of parrying in sabre, which skews your analysis. There is no contradiction between the statement that sabreurs assess and act in the middle of points and the statement that a jumped-up cat couldn't regularly parry at the speed that modern men's sabre is fenced. The speed of action constrains the options that one can meaningfully pursue. Human reaction time is pretty much fixed; sabre time is generally faster than you can react to successfully WITH A PARRY. Therefore, you react in other ways. It is not that you are not assessing and acting; it is that you are choosing courses of action that are more likely to be successful. I'm not saying that sabreurs don't have concepts about what they are going to do in a point, but if you just follow your concept, regardless of what your opponent is doing, you'll come off the strip with a 5-15 score and a quizzical look on your face.

I don't believe that someone will come along and suddenly change the game of sabre by reintroducing the parry--I fenced back in the days of steam sabre and the loss of the parry is directly related to the introduction of electric scoring--the electrics reveal that many attacks that we would have called parried in the days of steam sabre were in fact malpare.

As a corollary, you seem to imply that modern sabreurs can't parry--they can, and very well. It is that the parry has become less effective with the advent of electric scoring--a fundamental change. You say that the Smart-Podzniakov match was crying out for a parry-riposte (actually, I think there were a couple, I need to go back and look), but which one of them was going to take the risk--not Podz, he was winning with attacks--so Keeth would have had to have gone for the parry--I haven't watched Keeth fence much, so I don't know his game real well, but there aren't too many people who can successfully parry Podzniakov--because if you take a parry, he'll hit you somewhere else. You are right in that the hand is faster, but the hand that is attacking has a big advantage over the hand that is defending--It is much easier to hit than to parry in sabre.

And again, I don't think anyone who fences sabre goes for a simultaneous with the object of letting the director decide the touch willy-nilly, which you seem to imply by talking about "tempo esoterica"--you go in with the idea that you are going to win the touch by being faster, or that you (as Quart says) are going for a simultaneous with the intent of using it to set up the next point. But even that case, I'm looking for the opportunity to steal time.

It's also a game where you can win by never retreating, never searching for or meeting the opponent's blade, and you can turn a light on by closing your eyes and swinging.

No it's not, not at any level above a fairly rank beginner.

MR

[sabreman]

I think anyone who started fencing prior to electric (see Pozdniakov) are better hand fencers. Pozdniakov used his fast hand (didn't speed up with feet) to win time against Smart's flawed attack.

[sabreur]

Originally Posted by sabreman

I think anyone who started fencing prior to electric (see Pozdniakov) are better hand fencers. Pozdniakov used his fast hand (didn't speed up with feet) to win time against Smart's flawed attack.

Good insight--it seems to me as well that people who fenced before electric sabre do have better hands--unfortunately most of us are Vets now...

MR

[veeco]

I am by no means a sabre expert, but I do have one comment to make, based on the commentary of the France - USA semifinal I heard on TV.

What the commentator was saying was that basically the French team had not a chance of scoring if they would try and play a physical game. He admitted that the US team was much stronger than the French team physically, and that the only way to beat them was to try and outsmart (or rather "out-technicize") them.

I'd have to review the bouts to be sure, but it seemed to make sense at the time, and that's probably why most fencers would go into the simul game with the US team. They knew that they could not score when going backwards simply because they didn't have the legs to get the US fencers to miss their attacks. So they kept going forward, hoping that they would make the US fencers flinch on their attacks, or that they could setup a prise de fer. If I recall correctly, one of the Touya brothers scored a couple of nice prise de fer touches in this match.

As for the parry reposte game, as sabreur said, I think it is a risky game, that you can do only if you are sure that you can guess where the attack is coming. In terms of being more technical, it is getting more technical, but at the same it is more risky than going forward and hoping for the other guy to flinch or getting an opposition or a prise de fer.

Come to think of it, couldn't the large amount of simultaneous and attacks also probably help understand why the scores were so close in the bouts with the US team? Russia won 45-44, France won 45-44. If both these teams had had the legs to compete, they would have had more opportunities to make the game theirs and not have to resort to touches which are more dubious to judge and difficult to pull off correctly. If they had been THAT much more technical they would have scored more touches. The fact that they had less physical ability and that their technical ability wasn't high enough made for very close bouts.

[sabreman]

>>
Good insight--it seems to me as well that people who fenced before electric sabre do have better hands--unfortunately most of us are Vets now...
>>
Yes this is true. LOL!

[sabreman]

Veeco, You are right on target regarding Smart and Lee. The only exception is Rogers who is less athletic (coached by Nazlymov) and a more tactical fencer.

By the way the fastest sabre fencer I ever saw was Vilmias sp? Szabo from Romania. He was very successful at first but once the comp found out he was a one trick pony his results went down.

[wflaschka]

Originally Posted by sabreur

This could go on forever, but I'll try to keep it short.

And to think, this started from my premise that "sabre is more probabilistic than other weapons," something which got pounded into my head by sabre fencers.

I think you are seriously underestimating the difficulty of parrying in sabre, which skews your analysis.

No, that I'm not guilty of. I'm probably guilty of lots of other things tho.

When I fence sabre, I only find 1 parry out of every ~six parry attempts, against an easy fencer... and I only find those using commonplace probabilistic strategies. I could up my ratio if I had any training. Luckily, since parrying is difficult, sabre has built up a huge game around ignoring the blade. Without having any bladework, I still do walk-overs on sabre fencers merely by using distance and tempo (and I'm not magical, I merely reproduce what sabrists do). It's really not hard to get the fundamentals... all I have to do is make my body look and behave like the sabre fencers I watched in NYC, and half my points are already scored for me. I beat the top local guy (looow C on a US scale) the first time I picked up a sabre in 15 years, merely by running a program. That program is what's difficult for newbie fencers to figure out, and it's certainly no insult to sabre to say there's a baseline system that you start from. It's the same in foil, but not as clear-cut.

So that's where I'm coming from. You can say I'm simplifying, which is fine. But I'm also offering theories about why team USA was fenced differently; why team USA really flubbed the doubling-out; how the doubling-out schema isn't going to protect brain-dead fencers who want to hide for much longer (it grew in usefulness, it will fade); and propose some notions about the role of the hand.

I'm also thinking about what the next phase in sabre could be. I mean, it's gonna change. That's a no brainer. It's not going to look like this for the next 50 years, or even 20 months. It's silly to think this is the final iteration of the sport, and it will cease developing.

So (if we contrast our general arguments) either sabre is too fast and difficult for me to understand -- or sabre is interesting and we can look for evolution.

I don't believe that someone will come along and suddenly change the game of sabre by reintroducing the parry--I fenced back in the days of steam sabre and the loss of the parry is directly related to the introduction of electric scoring--the electrics reveal that many attacks that we would have called parried in the days of steam sabre were in fact malpare.

Yeah, when I fantisize about tactical changes, sometimes wishful thinking gets in. Then again, I'm not going to take positions where I know I'll get my butt handed back to me. The stuff I'm saying is all very predictable and cyclical.

Look for increased hand importance -- this isn't groundbreaking or earthshattering, it's merely inevitable. It's what happens when one part of technique peaks -- another part of technique grows to cancel it out and bring everything into balance. (For an example of hand-change, close-outs are now more feasible with the longer lunges; their presence in otherwise simple attacks in the 2004 olympic bouts is a pretty big difference from the 1984 olympics. The frequency is much different.)

If I was a sabre fencer with an insanely great hand and weak footwork -- you'd beat me using footwork. Presently, we have insanely great footwork -- so look for new hand stuff to beat it.

It sounds like you're implying that sabre handwork is maxed out, can't be improved. I don't think that's true.

It is that the parry ha