Spectators

[Arturo]

At a recent tournament I overheard a few fencers talking about spectators fans and lack of olympic coverage ect...

One of the fencers talking remarked that the average person is too stupid to understand our sport. That is not true... with a very brief explanation people catch up very quickly and can even make better calls than some rated directors.

Another thing why is our sport constantly compared to chess?? its either physical chess, chess with muscules, ect.... Personaly I think that fencing is nothing like chess!
Fencing is more like Karate or boxing than anything else??

thoughts???

[Dogstar]

Foil = chess

Epee = karate

Saber = boxing

[neevel]

Arturo--

Ever had a bout where you and your opponent just didn't have any 'killer' moves that worked on each other and allowed scores on the basis of technique alone, and thus had to spend a lot of time and effort on setting your opponent up for each touch, where each change of distance & tempo or blade-phrase had some definite purpose to create a scoring opportunity a few moves down the line? When you do, you'll understand the analogy. I had 1 and 1/2 bouts like that at a tournament yesterday (the 1/2 was when my legs just ran out of steam at 8-8 in the semifinal and I couldn't change direction or make the necessary tempo changes anymore ).

-Dave Neevel

[tsalyards]

The reason why fencing has a lack of spectators and/or fans is easy: fencing is a boring sport to watch. As a fencer I don't even enjoy watching other people fence all day. It just isn't geared for the spectator. The sport is too fast and the rules too ambiguous. I caution anyone who starts talking about making the sport spectator friendly.

-Tad

[d8m2k]

Ever had a bout that was so quick and athletic that you only had time for simple hand actions, yet the feet made compound actions? I had such a bout with Mike Marx. Such bouts only happen when both fencers train hard. Fencing analogies to chess apply just as much as it does to other sports.
Yes, fencing does require intelligence, so do most sports. Most competitive sports require adjustments and tactics based on what your opponent(s) does.
The difference from chess is that sports, including fencing, require physical excution of your thoughts and ideas.

[swordsen]

I have always avoiced the physical chess analogy for fencing because it only makes sense to someone who really plays chess! An awful lot of people think chess is monotony poured on top of boring.
to a chess player the analogy works, to others it scares them off.

ps. I am getting real tired of that elitest attitude that fencing requires more brains than most people have. That is a pathetic excuse people use because they want to feel superior to others.

[fred]

Some simple things, which have been mentioned numerous times, would be of great benefit to the spectator:

1) posted scores. If the director isn't miked, it's often difficult for the -fencers- to get the score. At least for DEs it would be a big help, for the ref and fencers as well.

2) Some chairs not occupied by fencers. Unfortunately, a regulation strip more or less occupies the width of your average gym, so if you have a lot of strips, there isn't much room to sit down, but it's always a sad sight watching hapless parents or friends wandering confusedly around a venue trying to find a place to stand that's not in the way of a bout or clumps of flak-jacketed fencers swaggering about.

3) A couple of signs indicating where restrooms can be found at the venue. At the Remenyik Open last month, which was in general very well run, the location of the men's room was a deep dark secret which could not even be explained by a couple of the Northwestern Univ. student team staff there. I eventually trailed a likely-looking fellow competitor familiar with Patten Gym to the spot.

4) some kind of clearly legible posted update of what the state of the competition is: pools, what DE round has started, etc.

<rant> Competitions have a bad habit of not updating the ladder as bouts complete, and the ladder is usually posted in 10pt. type or scrawled semi-legibly in pencil. Is there no print option for BIG LETTERS in any of the tournament software? I know that the milling scrum around the DE ladder sheet is an ancient tradition, but if it could be read from 5 ft. back it would clear out much more quickly. </rant>

Things like seats and the score to me are simple courtesy to a spectator independent of the sport. Their frequent indifferent execution at fencing competitions just reinforces the idea that the competition is for the benefit of the fencers, not the spectators. In money-making sports, it's the other way around.

I know full well what a pain in the butt it is to organize, host, and run a competition, esp. a large one. And it's pretty thankless, so I don't fault the clubs and people which put them on, but again, they/we are doing it for ourselves as competitors, so it's not surprising that the spectator gets left out.

Our club hosted a meet this past weekend, and we violated all of my comments here. (except the chairs part. We did have the chair thing happening.) In between bouts, I was accosted by 2 8-year old boys who had wandered in from outside and who asked to see my 'sword'. So I found them a spot to sit and gave them the condensed explanation. Luckily for me, we happened to be running epee at the time, and it was pools, so the stab five times and kill was easy to narrate. They thought the whole thing was way cool. Yes, 8 year olds that don't play chess get it. They're playing video games that are every bit as fast-moving as a sabre bout (without all that 'simultaneous' stuff so the speed thing is not a problem, either. If we spend a little bit of effort, it's not that hard to get people interested.

--fb

[Lumberg]

I see fencing kind of like chess because you can't just go out there and win by brute force as in boxing or karate.
There is the mental aspect of your strategy which is somewhat like chess. You can't attack 100% of the time. You can't defend 100% of the time. The smarter you are, the better your chances of winning. Don't you get that feeling of "Ha, you fell for that move!" when you do a feint, disengage and then score? Other thoughts are "I don't believe you fell for that one." or "You fool!" or "Luke, I am your father."

[Arturo]

Neveel, yes I have had a number of bouts that the only way to get a touch was to strategize
and plan ahead. But that is as far as the analogy goes. I have done a number of other sports(soccer, Tae... Karate ect..) and like d8m2k said the same applies to those as well.

The reason I don't like the analogy is because as Stu said "an awful lot of people think chess is monotony poured on top of boring." Do we really wan't to be assosiated with that?

What this analogy does is further the elitist view of this sport and diminishes the romantic feel that brought most of us into this sport.

Tsalyards, I don't think that fencing is boreing to watch and a lot of non fencers I know have enjoyed the experience.

We have all complained about the price of equipment, lack of publicity, ect... And when someone brings up that the more people need to get involved in the sport, the most heard comment is "people are too stupid to understamd this sport."-- that's just wrong.


PS- what I mean is comments like this " I see fencing kind of like chess because you can't just go out there and win by brute force as in boxing or karate." There is as much strategy in those sports as there is in fencing!!! WE ARE NOT THAT SPECIAL!!!!

Art

------------------
When you parry, riposte

[This message has been edited by Arturo (edited 11-07-2000).]

[neevel]

Well, you're absolutely right that any other sport requires plenty of thinking and strategy. (American) Football, despite it's reputation as being played mainly by bipedal oxen, is one of the most strategy intensive sports I can think about-- there's just no such thing as a dumb, good quarterback. I'm still not sure that worries about chess seeming elitist should be grounds for not using the analogy-- it does effectively convey the fact that this is not a pure technique based sport, and gets new fencers thinking about how they should look towards out-thinking opponents.


-Dave Neevel

[Gibral]

Personally I believe that people do not watch fencing because they do not understand it and it is too fast plus fencing is very similiar to boxing. Just look at the footwork. Boxing is all about keeping distance just like fencing.

[HilandDoug]

Well I, for one, ain't buyin'it! When I read Aldo Nadi's autobiography, I was struck by the fact that he was able to sell out large venues with spectators paying good money to see a fencing bout. Scalpers were outside selling tickets at inflated prices. This was not that long ago. (1920) What has happened since then to diminish interest? Lack of media coverage is one thing, but let's get rid of this elitist attitude. It only hurts the sport. Case in point: I was a huge baseball fan, until the elitist players went on strike and cancelled the world series. I used to be a big basketball fan, until the elitist athletes began to choke coaches, and get busted for stupid things, giving the impression that they thought they were bigger than the sport. The only sport I follow now is hockey, because the athletes are mostly good people, without the attitudes that they are better than their sport.

So four years from now, when the U.S. Women's foil team is in the running for a medal, we better see it on TV. And when Cliff is fencing for a medal, we had better see it. And those 8 year old kids will watch, wide eyed, if they get the chance. Will they understand the rules? They won't need to. They'll be watching the Olympics, they'll be watching a countryman in competition for a medal, and they'll root for him.

Sorry, I got off on a rant...

[Rapier9mm]

yes, fencing is a bit like chess in that it is strategical, but associating it with it is a killer. people see chess as slow & boring.
But it is not the only thing that has killed fencing i reckon.
In New Zealand we get little respect from people as fencers, especially from young people. They see it as sport for 'poofters'. Not only has lack of media coverage killed it, but i think movies are to blame for it the most. Altough there are good ones displaying some good stuff (i.e the Three Musketeers) I think people fail to see it as the original basis of fencing. The have seen movies where it is "parry, thrust!" and for those of you who have seen richie rich, now the stuff you can rip that to shreds with:
1: they hold their weapons slung across their shoulders. If that were the case how many people would be blind now???
2: One of the guys drops his foil parrying
3: How dated are those uniforms!!!!!?????!!!

I think that is the killer, and having it associated with a 'rich boys school' doesn't exactly help either. People fail to see how it has developed. The see the stuff in the movies which is slow wide parry, flat riposte. wher as we know better (especially sabreuers) which is fast & brutal at times. I think the lack of spectators is due to ignorance really. Publicity could do it some good.


------------------
Reuben
"Le singe violet laveur de vaiselle"

[Moonitic]

wow...misconceptions & stereotypes abound!

1. If you find fencing boring to watch, what the heck are you doing watching it? Even worse, what are you doing fencing? Learn something from the people out there. When someone gets a touch, find out how!

2. Think about a chess game. Strategy is right...what else is there? Chess isn't boring to people who do it, or to people who are interested in it. There's something there that makes people interested in it. Same thing with fencing. Find that spark. Is it the mental challenge? The cat & mouse? What is it??

3. Spectators most certainly don't think fencing is stupid. At least, that's what I've heard from the MANY people I've talked to who find out that I fence. They just don't know where & when a tourney is being held. They also think that: a. it will cost money, & b. it wouldn't be "for them"...we need to encourage people.

4. The average person can figure out that a green light on one side & a red light on the other means a touch. They're generally smart enough to know SOME history of swords, too. We're average too, you know...we just fence.
That doesn't make us all that special, unless we're Olympians...but still, the sport can be understood if people took the time to explain it. And believe me, once people understand it, their eyes light up & they watch the action so closely it's amazing. They get excited, pick favorites, you name it. I've seen it.

Sometimes when our club hosts a tourney, visitors to the school we're in poke their heads into the gym, too shy to step fully inside. It's only when a fencer goes up to them in a friendly manner & says, "You're welcome to come in & watch" that they do come in with smiles on their faces, then sit down to watch the action. Sometimes a fencer who has a break (ie.."watching the boring fencing") can explain to the spectator what is happening.

If people took more steps toward public relations & less toward encouraging the "elite" or "stupid" misconceptions, there would be more people watching us!

Ok, that was my soapbox for the day. I try to do everything I can to encourage the sport along, & it breaks my heart to see things like this.

[Lumberg]

Regarding fencing, drawing in new fans and spectators to the sport, and the media, there is only so much you can do to increase the popularity of a sport.
There are so many sports out there trying to draw in new fans. Unless there is good money to be made, the media is not going to cover it. Case in point (and I'm talking to all you fencers who were ticked off that fencing wasn't covered by NBC), did you complain when you didn't see any table tennis or badminton coverage? I didn't and it had nothing to do with following the rules and techniques of the sports. Were you writing letters of anger to NBC Sports that they didn't cover one second of men's middleweight weight lifting?
The USFA only has so much money and USOC is only going to allocate monies to sports where there is a better chance of getting a medal or where it is very popular in American.
I don't mean to be the devil's advocate but fencing just doesn't have what it takes to draw a crowd. Even the FIE recognizes that and tries to do things to change that including the "clear mask" idea and "change the scoring lights position" idea.
How many Americans would recognize any of the names of the top 10 men's or women's fencers in any weapon in any time period from any country? How many Americans recognize the names Michael Jordan, Babe Ruth, Joe Montana, Wayne Gretzky, and Mohammed Ali?


[This message has been edited by Lumberg (edited 11-09-2000).]

[Mergs]

I have been watching this discussion for many years (rec.sport.fencing) and figure I might as well weigh in on the subject. I just want to point out a few things for people to think about.

First, thirty years ago, in the US, only a few mostly nerdy kids played soccer, today it is everywhere.

There was coverage of fencing, albeit sparse, at Sydney this year. I was in Bosnia during the Olympics and the Armed Forces Network (AFN) showed it several times, usually at 11:30 AM, when we were at work, and didn't advertise it very well (yeah, I missed it all!).

Also there was a huge (well, for fencing coverage, that is) of Peter Westbrook's Foundation (USA Today, Good Morning America, NY Times, etc) just before the Olympics.

There are several financial companies that are using fencing as the theme for their commercials (real modern fencing, not swashbuckle!)(don't go looking to them for sponsorships! It's been tried, they don't give a damn about fencing, it just looks cool for the advertisements).

The Houston Olympic 2012 Commitee has fencing as one of the sports featured in their TV commercial. Most everyone associates fencing with the Olympics.

What does all this mean? Well, it means that the word is getting out and there is a campaign to educate people about fencing, certainly not synchronized or coordinated (especially by USFA!), BUT IT'S A START!

The Westbrook Foundation is a perfect model of how to get fencing out to the masses, even if they only try it for a couple of months. At least they will understand the fundementals of the game and can watch it with some knowledge of what is going on. Ask our European friends to explain American Football! The major sports are popular because most of us at least tried it growing up and know the basic rules!

Yes, there are many problems with venues, directors, etc that make viewing less than optimal, but I think that will work itself out eventually. As was pointed out earlier, Nadi managed to sell out venues (in Europe, where, oh gosh!, most everyone that paid to watch had been exposed to fencing in one manner or the other!) that were specifically set up to VIEW THE SPORT! Not for the sake of the competitors or competition.

Anyway, I drone on. The basic premise of my post is that it is possible to get the coverage, and there are alot of creative people out there doing good things, all we have to do is get out there and in greater numbers and do it. What would happen if all the fencers in the world taught two others to fence? Think about it. Who have you exposed to fencing lately?

[Gavin.com]

I have to go with Moon & Fred on this one!

Sometimes we're our own worst enemies. When people find out that I fence, around 80% of the time, they are REALLY interested in (a) finding out more about the sport, (b) trying it or (c) watching it. A bit of grass roots self marketing would help at local comps.

If I can use a "geeky" analogy, we've probably all seen boring web sites that, although full of relevant information, don't catch our eye or make it difficult to understand. On the other hand, a well presented / marketed site can have less "content" but be far more successful.

If we could make comps more understandable & appealing to spectators & did a bit of promotion, things could pick up.

I do think that the problem is that it is largely an amateur sport & people don't have the time & resources (nor inclination) to develop this side of things further. Hell, we can't even get local comp results posted up on the state web site here as people are busy doing other things!

That's my 2 bits worth!

Cheers

[Spruce Branch]

I have explained fencing "time" in one minute or less to spectators. They were then able to enjoy watching. They asked more questions, mind you, but they were GOOD questions.
I've had people walk up to me and say, "I just LOVE watching you fence." And I'm not all that great ("D" rank). But on days when I have good form.....good form is fun to watch. And a number of people have enjoyed watching the top guys. They're graceful, and the timing is usually simpler on the really skilled bouts. Parry, riposte, etc.

I know several people who have enjoyed spectating. But a simple explanation of fencing time for that type of weapon before competition starts would be ENTIRELY helpful to gaining spectators (double-touch vs. no double-touch, right-of-way or not, etc.). Plus, they have to have a place to sit where they can see the whole bout.

[swordsen]

I've seen alot of good sugestions and ideas. Now I just hope someone follows through instead of doing the same old thing again and then complaining later. (Arturo, the Elder is coming here is a chance...)
Unfortunetly, the latter is much more likely.... sigh.

[Moonitic]

Well, swordsen, you don't have to worry about me. I put my money where my mouth is. Not only does the book I wrote have fencing in it (historical, but still fencing), I make sure that people KNOW what I do. My back is a billboard when I wear my club jacket.

There ARE ways to make the sport more viewer friendly, & they all start with making the fencers themselves more friendly!

Merg & Gavin...amen to you! Let's keep doing what we're doing & show the world just how AWESOME our sport is!