More memorable: bouts won or bouts lost?

[Inquartata]

I'm going to bite on this one, and I know it's not proper to flame somebody, but for christ's sake, if you're going to be such a curmudgeon all the time you ought to blah blah blah....

Man, a two-sentence post draws a three-paragraph jeremiad dripping with intellectual arrogance. Don't you get enough fiber in your diet, or what?

Oh, wait, you're an epeeist. Maybe that explains it...

Anyway, someone with your obvious superior command of the English language should, one might think, recognize that "Christ" is a proper noun and therefore takes an initail capital. As long as I'm nitpicking and all.

Meanwhile, I stand by my reply. Some bouts are more memorable on some days or when thinking about certain things, and on other days or in other circumstances a different set of bouts spring to mind. Never is there exact parity, wins and losses. Doubtless I lack your perfect memory...or perhaps I just have more of them to sort through. So sue me.

[Zilverzmurfen]

I've had the good fortune of having 37 years of competetive fencing experience. --- 30% won, 70% lost

Wow. That's about 4 087,5 days of constant winning, that's pretty good!

[CoiledSnake]

Last fencing match I was at, some unoffiial just for fun type of match against some high schoolers and two other colleges. I was doing terrible that day, but my team (it was teams of three) ended up going against the undefeated team (other teammates were doing well...I wasn't). Like the second guy I fight is some 'C' ranked dude. Well, I'm unranked so if you look at ranks I was pretty outmatched...but whenever that happens I get a lot of energy and such so I was pumped.

Match starts, he gets like 3 quick points on me (foil fencing btw). I start jumping up and down really fast and he slows down, some what confused, then I jump back and charge him. Before I get to him, I leap up as high as I can (super energy...I probably was up a good four feet in the air...or something). I did this crazy twirly thing with my blade and shouted (or thought...can't remember) "COILED SNAKE ONLY STRIKES ONCE!"

And I got a point.

Only once. (I might've gotten another one doing something equally crazy, but it wasn't the coiled snake attack)

But the look of absolute confusion on his face and on the mediator guy made it all worth it. I was the victor in spirit.

[Feltan]

Oh this is easy for me.

In 1977 I was fencing in a Grand Prix event, which I went to simply because it was close-by. I entered in all three weapons, and had a good time in saber and epee, but not such good results.

At the time I was also a C rated in foil (old AFLA ratings), and all of 16 years old. To make a long story short, I beat the then current Olympic Gold medal foilist 5-3 in the initial pool. For about three seconds you could have heard a pin drop in the auditorium, and then his coaches starting screaming in Italian at him and at the director -- they seemed content to ignore me. The glory was short lived, despite good seeding results I ended up meeting him again in my second DE and got trounced 15-4 or so IIRC.

I still remember that victory like it was yesterday.

Regards,
Feltan

[Stryder]

Victories are nice, but it's my absolute hatred of losing that motivates me. Every major loss in my fencing history still can make my blood boil.

Especially this one time doing the finals in the Mall when I thought I would go easy on a guy...

I hate that Mall. It's been years and I still don't shop there.


Is that wierd?

[seak]

The bouts that I most remember are ones were something special happens. Winning my first tournament, the DE into the Top 16 at Temple or conversly losing on a red card or after having the ref place me off the strip.

[FencingKitten]

I remember all kinds of bouts - mine, my friend's, win or lose, for something special about it.

I remember my first DE win, not because I won, but because it was my first example of a referee really, really blowing every other call he made. My TA at the time said that on merit, I had won - I was having a better day - but on merit, the ref lost. I remember my second DE win, for how hard I had to work at it - it was thrilling. My friend Josh's 1st place at the Oz in Unrated epee, because he went outside the box - he had a song stuck in his head, and he danced. The entire bout. On his way to congratulate Josh, our coach was stopped by his opponent. "I just have one question. WHO THE HELL DANCE IN EPEE!!!!" It was awesome. My third and most recent DE win, because someone didn't learn - 15 touches, at least 10 of which were parry riposte in the same line. The entire bout. I didn't have to adapt - she failed to do so for me

I remember my first DE loss, because I got carded for corps-a-corps for the first time, and broke my first weapon. It was great! I remember another DE loss, because I got 9 points, in a row, because someone didn't learn fast enough. She beat me 15-9, after having been up 8-0. That felt good. Subsequent to my third win, oso97's prize pupil handed me my gear on a shiny sabre platter, 15 touches using... you guessed ... one move. The entire bout. I knew what she was doing, but I couldn't break myself out of the patter. I got two touches that bout, and both were from having had to break my pattern so drastically, it wasn't even close to my comfort zone.

The memorable bouts aren't because I win or lose, they're memorable because of how it affected my game. Any bout I remember, I remember because it spoke to me, in the way that only unique (to me) fencing can.

[tchwojko]

Five bouts that stick in my head, 3 wins, 2 losses. (Epee)

DE to get to the semi-finals, very intense bout, both of us fencing equally well. We get to 14-14. The entire bout I've been setting up a toe-touch. I go for it, my light, I'm certain I hit the toe, my opponent is too, ref is certain I didn't. Take 2: my opponent hits me with a counter-riposte that finished with a fleche. My opponent and I start to shake hands, ref disallows the touch saying it was after he passed. Take 3, I don't even remember the touch, but I somehow got it. It was the single most entertaining bout I've ever had, and it was irrelevant whether I won or lost. We knew each other well, and we each pulled out every tactic and strategy we had, and fenced one of the cleanest bouts we were each capable of.

Early in my college carreer, I was the #3 fencer going up against #1. He was sloppy and I managed to get to 4-4. I have no idea what I'm doing, he completely startles me with a perfectly timed fleche, I squeak, close my eyes and stick out my arm as he hits me. I congratulate him, and then notice that my light is on and I must have barely touched his hand as he came in.

Same fencer, Midwest Regionals two years later, I beat 5-4 (still with some luck, but at least I have a clue now), he shakes hands, goes to his reel, and smashes his bell guard into a fortune cookie. (Nicest guy in the world, just very frustrated that day.)

Fencing at a local tournament I'm losing 4-0 to a talented foil fencer who is ripping me apart whenever I do anything offensive. Failing to get anywhere near touching him, I slowly push him back to his own end line, pretend to try to push him off, pretend to be disappointed and switching tactics, and launch an attack. He steps back, and does a very clean riposte a foot behind his line. Annoyed he starts attacking me, I bring it back to 4-4. Unfortuantely, he realizes what he's done, gets priority at time and waits for me to impale myself. It felt good to make a bout out of disaster.

A few years ago, after a long hiatus, I'm competing, albeit out of shape, down 7-1 in the semifinals DE. I get some adrenaline, and repeat the same sequence 5 times to bring it to 7-6. My opponent is totally flustered, but right then I completely and utterly ran out of gas. I could barely hold the weapon, and I couldn't move much. It brought home what I could do if I just spent some effort on endurance.

[fencerbill]

About ten years ago at the New England division Championships. Was involved with setting up so I didn't get one second to warm up. First bout in the Epee pool. I was fencing Chris Paine, An A although he might have been a B then.

So I decided to just let the bout go as long as possible and try to get as much movement as I could to warm up for my other bouts. I didn't say anything to Chris.

Touch, another, and then all the way up to 4-0 for me since this was completely unlike any way I had ever fenced Chris before.

But then, being the good fencer he was, he realized what I was doing and beat me 5-4.

[yeoldearmourer]

Most most remenber bout was a win against Doug Farley In Cleveland Ohio he had to beat me to go up and since he had always beated me in epee he thought it was going to be easy the score was 4-4 and I did a fleech as the referee called fence as I went by I heard the machine and knew I won the bout never had beated him in 3 years. The other bout was against a young lady thaat had 6 months before had won the Settale NAC in Div 2 epee. 6 months after I had Knee surgery I decided to come out of retirement I hadn't fence in 12 years She was in my pool and I beat her 5 -2 she walked off the strip shanke her head wondering how and old man did that to her. Those are two bouts I enjoyed. The lost that was most remenber was a foil bout in New York against the Number 1 Men Candian frencer I had him down 4-0 I had thought he was beating me 4-0 when I realize that I was winning I tryed to fence foil and lost 5-4. The other Lost was against Geroge Masin took him to 4-4 and lost 5-4.

[Padawan]

Winning - never give up.

One bout that I tell students is the final bout in at the Div 2 NAC in Chicago for first place in 1995. I was lossing 8 to 13 in foil to Sachs. My ex was there learning to become a national ref and was cheering for him which I saw out of the corner of my vision. I came back and won 15-14.

Lossing - never shake the cage of the lion

I was fencing at the NAC Div 1 in Atlanta in 1994-1995. Going into the round of 16 I drew Peter Westbrook. The score when point for point until we reached 8-8. We then had a phrase, toe to toe that had 3 parry -riposte exchanges and I got the point. At which point he exclaimed Wow! That was the last point that I scored! I felt as though I had kicked the sleeping lion and it ripped me to shreds!!