Hard hits to the neck -- no blood, but **** that hurts!

[Warrior Princess]

Yeah, those suck. Whenever I fence my ex-boyfriend in epee, he hits me in the throat, on the windpipe, hard. He says it's because if he extends his arm, it's at the exact level as my throat (he's tall). What I really hate is when foils slip under the bib and scrape you or bruise you in the throat. The marks tips leave look like hickies (at least when they're relitivly small and on the neck). I'm in high school, and I don't think I'll ever hear the end of the times when I come to school with a giant bruise on my throat. I had transfered at the beginning of the second quarter, and on my first day at my current high school; I had a neck injury from a tournament the previous weekend. They all thaught I was some kind of slut. It took a while to explain.

[epeeisky]

Sometimes when marks are left it is worse. After about a month back to fencing after a long fencing break due to surgery, there were several small red pock marks on the front of my elbow(where you typically get blood taken). Some of my teachers would stare at my arm for awhile when these poped up, but I just took it that they were shocked that fencing was a contact sport(another story entirely). Well after about a week of the staring I got a note to come to the senior counselor at school. I figured that she wanted to talk to me about a scholarship I applied for, but was I soon disproven about that. Apparently my teachers told her that they noticed several needle marks on my arm, and were concerned that I was on drugs. So, after about an hour talking to her about my fencing habits and how everyting worked, she was finally convinced that I was not on drugs. The I had to have a talk with all my teachers about why they would see me with epee marks on my arm for the next couple of months, and they had we all had a big laugh about the whole thing(plus it got me out of physics for a day).

[Go? Fencing?]

Lately, I've been getting an absurd number of hard hits to the neck. Not a lot quantitatively, but in proportion to the amount of pain, it's a lot! I think I'm going to cut a strip out of my old plastron and sew a collar onto my new one for another layer of protection. I was going to donate my old plastron to my college club, but my neck is more important than my club having one more piece of equipment.

[sabreur]

Inq, you forgot the great Tom Lehrer:

"Plagiarize,
Let no one else's work evade your eyes,
Remember why the good Lord made your eyes,
So don't shade your eyes,
But plagiarize, plagiarize, plagiarize -
Only be sure always to call it please 'research'."

TSE: "Bad poets imitate; good poets steal."

[fencingfrog]

I hate neck shots. They hurt and they mess up where my mask is sitting, and then my glasses get messed up and I cant see!!

[luv2fence]

I am very concerned about these neck shots.
How can we make this safer using better
technique or protective equipment?

A tight circle 6, done with an extended arm,
seems to naturally hit the high line from
shoulder to bib. Circle 6 with bent arm and
stronger press tends to land close to the bib.
I have not been doing these actions very long,
because they only recently started working for me.

To complicate things, the defender may be part
of the problem.

The defender may resist the pressing to
greater or lesser degree and he may retreat
in varying distances, or not at all. Also the defender
may try to slightly lift your blade so, if you are
aiming low, your blade is lifted to his bib or mask.

Any specific suggestions?

[SabreFerret]

Do they? One of the first questions I frequently get when people find out I fence is "Doesn't that hurt?"

I dunno, the first question I usually get is "You fence? Like, you put up fences?"

[Phaeton]

I dunno, the first question I usually get is "You fence? Like, you put up fences?"

I get: "You fence eh? I've got this TV that I stole and...can you be the middle man? You'll make a nice profit"

The crowd that I associate myself with is a little bit sketch I suppose.