New Article: New Foil Rules and their Impacts

[Craig]

This article took me longer than expected to get up online, but it is a view of the 2004-2005 season's foil timings from Italian point of view:

http://www.fencing101.com/content/view/430/35/

Thanks to gladius for the translation and Maestro Bernacchi for permission to post.


Craig

[Mr Epee]

I read it... it is good.

[Feraud]

I don’t agree with his observation regarding the blocking time

“In fact, the opponent can touch the attacker during his fully conventional and regular attack, preventing him to finish his attack within the 300 ms allowed by the new rules.”

300ms is in no way a short enough interval to allow a simple counterattack to get one light on a conventional attack. If an attack or riposte can’t score within 300ms then it’s way out of time. I can make an attack with my weapon held behind my hip, run straight into a point-in-line and still manage to finish within 300ms (and any decent referee shouldn’t give me the touch in that case either) I don’t see that the new reduction in blocking time has had any effect on foil.

[canthidefromme]

Originally Posted by Feraud

If an attack or riposte can’t score within 300ms then it’s way out of time.

Um... no...

[tbryan]

Originally Posted by Feraud

I don’t agree with his observation regarding the blocking time

“In fact, the opponent can touch the attacker during his fully conventional and regular attack, preventing him to finish his attack within the 300 ms allowed by the new rules.”

In theory, the 300 ms blocking time can cause this to happen. I agree, though. I have rarely seen it happen in an actual bout.

Personally, I don't really have a problem with the new blocking time. I found the whole section of that article on parry-ripostes to be a bit odd. For example,

"The same applies to attacks. Many fencers feel less confident in their own attacks, because they fear they will be cut-off by an opponent’s counter-attack."

Nope...I'm not really worried about the block out time. The reason that the counter-attack and remise are so much more effective is the debounce timing change. When my opponent attacks and immediately remises, he may lean forward, exposing less target. Assuming that I made the parry, the 300 ms gives me plenty of time to riposte. It's just that there's a fair chance that my riposte won't actually register, sliding down his chest a bit or bouncing off of his shoulder or side (even on a straight shot). The flick riposte is an option in these cases, but it's much harder to hit now. On the old timings, it used to make the attack-and-remise as much less viable option since the remiser would normally just be flicked on the shoulder.

Similarly for counter-attacks. I don't fear a counter attack because of the block out time. I have to worry about the counter-attack because even if I manage to hit the lame, if the counter-attack is executed with some sort of esquive, I may only land a glancing shot. I used to be able to hit a dodging opponent on the old timing just by angling my weapon and catching a bit of lame. Now, I need to make sure that I "stick" the attack. That's much harder to do if my opponent is good at this type of dodging counter-attack.

And we haven't even mentioned the solid hits on the chest that sometimes don't register. That will certainly make a fencer less confident in his first action.

[FrankV]

Great article on foil but what about an article of the effects on the sabre game with the new timing changes? Is it the same as for foil?

[Mario Montalvo]

Hello everyone!

I have finished reading the article of Maestro Alberto Bernacchi discussing the new rules of foil fencing and their practical impact on the fencing community and I could not agree more. I strongly recomend the article to everybodyspecially if you are a foil fencer. I really don't know if these rules will prevail eventually, but I have a hunch they won't.

Take care everyone,
Allways at your service
Maestro Montalvo

[wflaschka]

Excellent article, though imho the fear of counter-attacks, and counter-attacks trumping parries, is overstated. There is no permanent bonus from the block-time change, not once you've accommodated the timings. In real life, getting locked out by block-time just makes you use tighter and faster attacks. It's a reminder, not a sea change.

For example in the the La Coruna men's foil final, France vs Italy. Cassara is tall, counter-attacky and very very good. But his attack+remise+counter-counter-counter machine-gun approach was easily handled by tight beat attacks from Le Pechoux and parry-ripostes from Attely. Le Pechoux is like 12 inches shorter than Cassara and still won with his offense.

Pumping hand -- "The new rules have caused a statistically significant increase of the touches executed this way." I haven't seen this. If there is an increase in touches from hand-pulling, then that would falsify the whole counter-attacks-rule idea. Pulled-hand attacks were reliably killed by stop-hits and counter-attacks under the old timings, and it's even more true now. Hand-pullers like Guyart suffered so heavily, early on, that I'm surprised to see it mentioned here.

I also find the "speed of attack is slower" observation interesting. In our own training, we've had to get faster and tighter to be able to own the attack and get it to target. The trend seems to be going from landing attacks "whenever" with the march, to solidly constructed, simple attacks with accelleration. You can still pump and wave the arm, but only if the opponent is buying into your threat.

[cfaustus]

Very interesting analysis.

About what I was expecting, however, I was surprised by the comment that pumping actions increased. Now, please correct me if I am wrong, but a pumping action must begin with a pulling back of the arm. As such, under current interpretations of the rules, it is not an attack with priority until the point when the arm ceases moving back and begins to extend. This would seem to me to be a bad thing because it opens one up to being attacked in preparation. Not to mention that drawing one's arm closer to the body generally decreases ones ability to maneuver and as such might effect the ability to parry an attack into prep. Most pumping actions that I have seen (and again, it may be different at higher levels) also seem to be executed when the fencers have gotten to close(r) distance. Often there seems to be a failed attack which brought the attacker too close parried by a heavy parry made either standing one's ground or even moving into the attack. While the defender has sufficiently defended themselves, because of the poor control of distance, the fencers now find themselves too close for the defender to riposte by a simple extension or the attacker to reprise or remise with a simple extension as the case may call for. In order to free their blade from the other's, who ever wishes to attack often pulls the arm back beginning the pumping attack. A more efficient attack in this case would seem to be an angulation attack, or even, if one is confronted by one beginning a pumping action, to do an angulated attack into their preparation.

Any thoughts on this? Have I interpreted this correctly?

[fencerontheline]

Originally Posted by cfaustus

Any thoughts on this? Have I interpreted this correctly?

I think you've used too many fancy words and too many what-ifs to be practical or correct. The best answer is usually a simple one.

[gladius]

Originally Posted by FrankV

Great article on foil but what about an article of the effects on the sabre game with the new timing changes? Is it the same as for foil?

This is excerpted from the maestro's comments in another forum regarding saber parries which you may find interesting:

http://campechesteel.proboards15.com...ead=1123112544

Original question:

We have our sabre fencers en garde. The command is given to fence. Both advance, essentially simultaneously.

Fencer X initiates the first offensive act by attempting your basic head cut. Fencer Y employs a basic parry-5. There is contact. The blades keep in motion. There is no discernable stop in motion (which I add only out of nagging thought it may be an influence in some of the calls) Fencer X's blade slides quickly along the parrying blade, even as Fencer Y begins the wrist twist to riposte to Fencer X's cheek.

Fencer Y successfully ripostes to Fencer X's cheek. At the same time, by moving his blade for the riposte, while X kept his blade sliding along toward the tip, he allowed X's blade to slide off and onto Fencer Y's chest or shoulders.

Two lights.

Everything I know of conventional weapons says the riposte carries. My query, though, is there a point where the parry is so insignificant that Fencer X will get the touch. I ask because I've seen this move called both ways.


The case of the saber parries as posted

This is a problem often encountered in saber and generates discussions between referees, fencers, and coaches about the definition of "mal parré" (bad/weak parry) and related discussions.

Mal parré, as its name implies, is a badly/poorly executed parry. The rules acknowledge that there was an attempt to parry by the fencer, but this attempt failed because of poor execution (usually too weak and overpowered by the inertia of the hit which it was supposed to defend against).

In the case presented, the attacking hit will reach the target anyway, just by pushing its way through the parry. Even if the fencer that parried tries to riposte, thinking that he's earned ROW because he just grazed the attacker's blade, or because in his subconscious he knows that he intended to parry, he is always wrong also because in reality his riposte will always arrive after the touch of the attacker.

In a nutshell, if I attack you and you parry badly/weakly, my attack will immediately touch you in the target area because your ineffective parry will not allow you to deflect my hit. At this point, even at the speed of the saber action, the action per se is concluded, regardless anything you may be doing afterwards. The attack touches, full stop and there is no parry.

If by reflex or instinctively you try to riposte anyway (in general he who executes a mal parré is always convinced to have done a good parry instead), and all this takes place within few tenths of a second after being hit, the referee doesn't have the material time to halt the action immediately. This however doesn't change the substance of the reconstruction of the action. Attack touches, there is no parry, everything else that follows has the same validity as if one of the two would hit the other one minute after having been touched himself by a direct hit. This about the mal parré (weak parry).

The situation described can be interpreted in 4 different ways and it is not as simple as presented.

A. Fencer Y executes a parry of quinta (fifth) a fraction of a second before X launches his attack to the head

In this case X does an "attacco sopra il ferro" (attack on the blade, i.e., over the parry already set in place by Y to cover the target. This is not a valid attack because an attack must threat an unprotected target, and any time the attack hits the opponent's blade already placed in a parry position, it is not a valid attack, unless it is powerful enough to overcome by force the position of Y blade (it would be better to say in this case that Y executed a mal parré (weak parry) which doesn't really cover/protect the target).

The deployment of the parry by Y an instant before X attack has a tactical reason to exist for trying to take advantage of the opponent's instinct and turn it against him. This is what the Russians did in the mid '80s when they made this action a winning characteristic of their school of saber fencing. As soon as the "Allez!" command was given they would make a step forwards and put themselves right away in the position of parry fifth, regardless what the opponent had done in the meantime. 90 times out of a 100, the opponent was lured instinctively to land his hit on the Russian parry who was now in a position of advantage because he (the Russian) already knew where the attack would have ended and could both riposte easily and even more important could nullify in this way an attack against a covered target, and therefore the attack wasn't an attack any longer.

In Italy, they used to call this "quinta calamita" or "magnetic fifth" because the mere fact of putting oneself in the parry position before the attacker could decide where to hit, it had the "psychological effect" to direct and attract -- like a magnet -- the opponent choice of action precisely on the target already covered by the parry. Nevertheless, this "anticipated parry" had to be executed well. If the attacker with a very powerful hit succeeded in clearly overpowering the parry, the attack was valid, like in the case of the mal parré (weak parry). All touches through the blade which overpower a parry, are valid if they clearly touch the target.

B. Y parries the attack already launched by X (say 2 tenths of a second after X starts his attack and Y sees him starting the attack, and another 2 tenths of a second between when Y decides to parry and actually executes the parry)

In this case also it is not enough to lightly touch the blade for one to claim that he executed a parry. You must actually stop an attack before a riposte. If one hurries too much to riposte usually he does not correctly execute the parry and risks to limit the parry to a grazing of the blades falling in the situation described as weak parry. But even in this case one must distinguish three situations:

• Y parries after X hit has already landed on the target -- in this case Y has simply parried late and therefore obviously he's touched.

• Y parries before X hit lands -- Y parried correctly and earned the right to riposte

• Y parries contemporaneously with X hit --Y will be right only if his action does not fall in the weak parry and will completely deflect the opponent's blade.

C. Y parries correctly and while he ripostes X insists (continues his attack), violating the convention, either with a remise, or simply continuing by inertia his attack

In this case Y parry is valid, but it must be clearly evident that in the action of the attacker there is a perceptible time interruption between the conclusion of the attack and its resumption (wrong) after the parry (correct) of the defender. This signals that the first attack was completed and parried and that everything that happens afterwards is a new "attacco di insistenza" (continuing/persisting attack).

This is the only case when one can also bring in the discussion the new timings as a factor to be considered by the referee to reconstruct the action. Since the timings in saber, as in foil, have been reduced, if Y delays too much his riposte, he can be anticipated by the continuation by "insistence" (persistence) of X attack and only one light will come up. This is more likely to happen in saber than in foil because in saber the weapon arm is a valid target and it is much easier to persist with a second hit and immediately thereafter escape out of measure to let the blocking time run out without letting the fencer who had the right to riposte execute it within the required time.

The new timings don't affect at all the parry per se, but rather the riposte.

The referee does not decide if the fencer has executed a mal parré or not. If there is a mal parré the light of the attacker comes on immediately. If the parry is executed correctly, the light quite simply doesn't come on.

There are extreme cases when the hit doesn't clearly land on target and the parry is neither too weak to be a mal-parré, nor sufficiently strong to be a perfect parry. But to say that the interpretation is random and that it depends only from the referee is a typical statement from the point of view of the fencer. In reality as long as the referee knows what he is supposed to know, he judges according to visual parameters which are precise. In conclusion it's easy to recognize a mal parré from a good parry also because the judge is supposed to look at the global context of the action.

D. Y executes a beat, not a parry, on the attack in preparation of X, an extremely rare case in saber which cannot be excluded however, if X in that particular situation is just slightly slower or more undecided than what is the norm.

Suppose that X moves his arm to hit, but suspends/interrupts his action, and Y touches lightly his blade in fifth and than executes his hit. This generally causes the conclusion of the attack by X, and this can lead someone to confuse this particular situation with an attack and mal parré. These are very minute differences which are very difficult to be perceived by the eye -- we are talking few milliseconds -- but in any case there is a conceptual difference between a beat and a parry.

Some cases which are generally described as mal parré are in fact beats on the blade correctly executed by Y and an incorrect continuation of the attack by X. It may be quite difficult for the referee to enter in these fine details, in particular if the action is between expert fencers who react very rapidly.

Just to be clear, in the rules for parries, quite differently from the rules on beats, it doesn't matter with which part of your blade you oppose an attack. The only important thing is that your parry deflects the hit. Unfortunately, many referees don't consider valid effective parries which deflected a hit but which were executed with the foible part of the blade, because they confuse between the rules for parries and the rules for beats. This happens everywhere, but we are talking here of inexperienced referees who judge at regional tournaments (hopefully).
.......

The distance between the fencers and the determination of who actively controls measure has nothing to do with judging a parry. It influences the action, to be sure, but a parry is a parry, independently from the interpretation of the measure between the two fencers. In teaching it may have some importance, but in refereeing nothing at all.

In conclusion, for a more complete discussion of the problem it seems to me that in this thread a very important reference to the rules is missing, namely T.70 of the FIE technical rule book which states clearly in paragraph "c) Les coups à travers le fer, c'est-à-dire qui touchent en même temps le sabre de l'adversaire et la partie vulnérable, sont valables toutes les fois qu'ils arrivent nettement sur la surface valable." (Hits through the blade, i.e., those who touch at the same time the opponent's saber and the valid target, are valid whenever they arrive clearly on the valid target).


Craig has been kind to accept these contributions and I'll try my best to put them in a form which is acceptable and understandable in English. This is not always easy because of the different terminology used only by Italians [this will be the topic of a separate posting].

[rocky]

Originally Posted by Feraud

I don’t see that the new reduction in blocking time has had any effect on foil.

You're joking, right?

[OROD]

Originally Posted by Feraud

300ms is in no way a short enough interval to allow a simple counterattack to get one light on a conventional attack. If an attack or riposte can’t score within 300ms then it’s way out of time. I can make an attack with my weapon held behind my hip, run straight into a point-in-line and still manage to finish within 300ms (and any decent referee shouldn’t give me the touch in that case either) I don’t see that the new reduction in blocking time has had any effect on foil.

I think Feraud is smoking some good stuff.


.

[sabreur]

I thought the foil article was quite interesting--among other things, a very nice short explanation of right of way, which would also pertain to sabre. I really like the combination of initiative and threatening action in this quote:

In foil fencing, the fencer who first attacks, by using the ROW because of initiative (advancing towards the opponent) and threatening action (weapon lined-up to hit the opponent), will always have the right to score a point even if he was to be touched first by the opponent.

The longer posting about sabre parries gives me some pause. With the new timings, referees almost always call this action:

A: attacks.
B: parries/ripostes.

Both lights go on.

As a valid parry-riposte for B. The logic being that if both lights go on, then B must have stopped A's attack long enough for the parry to be sufficient. I think this helps sabre, since the problem of whipovers is still significant--this is where I thought the posting on sabre parries fails--it ignores the fact that it is very possible for someone to either hit way too hard or hit with the flat and have the blade whipover a valid parry. The advantage of the new timings is that if you get your riposte in within a tenth of a second in such a case, you'll get the action called in your favor--under the old timings, the whipover would often (always, in my experience) be called as a valid attack.

The new timings do require very fast riposte action to avoid being closed out by a remise, but they also give the parry a bit more of a chance.

MR

[edew]

I agree with Feraud: I've not experienced any stop-hits that prevents my attack or riposte from arriving in time. Maybe it did occur, but not with any direct attacks or direct ripostes. (At the same time, I have not successfully manage to make counter-attacks work with one light by hitting with more than 300ms before the arrival of the attack or riposte. I did try using a french-grip once to hit early, but the opponent never got to touch me.)

As for saber, there's not as much controversy or disappointment by the fencers. Yes, a nice parry-riposte might still get locked out by a quick remise, but generally, a good parry will arrive in time. Just don't be lazy.

The big question is, what is going to happen this season? Anyone have any ideas of what will happen this season with regards to new foil timings?

[Neil]

Originally Posted by OROD

I think Feraud is smoking some good stuff.


.

Ok, do this experiment.

Get a friend and both hook up to a strip with a box using the new timings. One of you advance-lunge attacks with your hand on your hip, the other guy tries to attack in prep and then run away before the attacker extends to hit. I'm no elite fencer, but when I tried this, there was no way I could use the 300ms blockout time to lock out the attacker's hit with my counterattack.

Counterattacks are favoured with the new timings, but I reckon it's because of the 13-15ms contact time. The sudden change in target position of the counter-attacker makes it hard for the attacker to place their point nicely, so they miss because the new contact time punishes any hits where the point doesn't fix on the target.

[dilznik]

This pretty much sums up the feeling of a lot of the "anti-new-rules" people (including me): I am also perplexed by what be described as a desire to slow down the natural evolution of the technical action. It's as if one would impose to go back to the old and heavy wooden tennis racquets to make the movements of the players slower and more harmonious in the name of a certain "tradition."

But I disagree with him here: I am totally opposed to make a third change, i.e., making the weapon arm also a valid target in foil. This would just flatten the differences between the way to fence the three weapons.

Under the current system, people are hiding behind their bibs and front arm and having a decent amount of success with it, especially when there's a lefty fencing a righty. The amount of useable target has already been reduced by sidelining the flick, and now people reduce it even more by hiding behind their arm. As long as this is possible, then the upper arm should also be target. Eventually people will figure out ways to widen the surface they're blocking, with larger jackets with motocross arm pads maybe, in the same way ice hockey goalies have massive leg pads. Make the arm target and foil fencing may actually start to look like something people might find interesting again.

[garyhayenga]

Originally Posted by edew

I agree with Feraud: I've not experienced any stop-hits that prevents my attack or riposte from arriving in time. Maybe it did occur, but not with any direct attacks or direct ripostes. (At the same time, I have not successfully manage to make counter-attacks work with one light by hitting with more than 300ms before the arrival of the attack or riposte. I did try using a french-grip once to hit early, but the opponent never got to touch me.)

As for saber, there's not as much controversy or disappointment by the fencers. Yes, a nice parry-riposte might still get locked out by a quick remise, but generally, a good parry will arrive in time. Just don't be lazy.

The big question is, what is going to happen this season? Anyone have any ideas of what will happen this season with regards to new foil timings?

I agree with both EDEW and Feraud. In all the experiences I've had with the 300ms foil lockout, tournament and practice, I've only ever seen the lockout make a difference on double-disengage ripostes.

I'm fairly slow, but I can still easily get a light to go off with an advance-lunge after I get hit with a stop hit.

I think a lot of the time people don't get a light, in foil, after getting hit with a remise or a stop-hit they're saying to themselves, 'I got locked out', but it's just the broken debounce timing again.

I think increasing the foil lockout time to 400ms would help allow those nice double-disengage ripostes to go off. But since they're always against me that wouldn't actually *help* me any.

For that matter, I guess the broken debounce timing works in my favor as well. It makes everyone else fence as slow and ugly as I do all the time. But I don't enjoy that. It's just not fun.

gary hayenga