Suggestions for intermediate classical foil drills?

[dichlorofencer]

Hello, everyone.

I was google searching "Classical foil drills," when I came upon this website. I found the forum and thought, "well this is perfect."

I have been fencing Italian foil for three years and have gotten to the point where my instructor decided that any new foil students who wanted lessons would get siphoned off to me. As it is, I only have one private student. We have had about eleven lessons and I'm getting to the point that I'm running out of drills (and my student seems to actually practice and have body awareness). Every once in a while I have a moment of brilliance in creating a drill of my own, but I am still a student myself.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

As a note, it's a left-against-right scenario, if drill suggestions need to be altered accordingly. We've covered simple attacks, all eight parries, ripostes, circle parries, disengages, feints, transports, glide attacks, beats, binds, every version of prise de faire I've read of, ballestras, and double lunges. (Please pardon my lack of French; my instructor is only now switching from the Italian tradition to the French for teaching.)

Any guidance is greatly appreciated!

[catwood1]

I don't know exactly what you mean by classical fencing, and how it is different to modern sport fencing.

If you are looking for a way to become a better coach, then serving as an apprentice at a club nearby with a good coach can be a good way of doing it. Also there are numerous coaching clinics put on by the USFCA over the course of the year.

[CvilleFencer]

As Catwood1 notes, the definition of classical fencing is somewhat fluid. I also find it very difficult to put drills into words, one of the things that drive my asst. coaches nuts. I tend to have an active tactical/technical style of giving lessons with several decision points built in depending on the level of the fencer.

Not sure if this is what you are looking for or not, but one of the basic drills I use (and then build it up depending on the level of the fencer) goes something like this:

Fencer is at Lunge (L) distance. The que is the coach presenting the blade. The student beats the blade (make sure the beat is correct) and lunges (have student hold lunge and inspect for correctness before releasing).

The next step is as above, but at Advance Lunge (AL distance).

Once that looks good, start moving. I like a simple repeatable pattern of steps, usually in 3's or 4's such as advance, advance, retreat. Make sure the student is moving small and keeping good distance. Present the blade as the que with the student doing an advance, beat and lunge (pay attention to the foot/hand tempo, and often a good time to introduce the concept of F/H tempo) and ensure all is correct in the lunge before releasing.

After the advance/beat/lunge is solid, have the student recover without a release very quickly and move the drill in a very fluid manner, making the student beat/hit/recover and keep distance and movement. Accelerate/decelerate as needed.

Once the footwork/bladework and temp/distance is solid, you can build other things into the drill. Have them work second intention into the drill, do a parry/reposte and have them work on counter parries. Let the coach pull distance on the beat and have the student take the extra step before the lunge. Do the drill with opposition/binds. Have the counter parry reposte be with a disengage. Throw in check steps by the coach into the footwork pattern or do away with the pattern altogether.

Until you get to a certain level, it matters less the framework you do your lessons in and more the ingredients you use in the lesson. When it is level appropriate I am a big fan of mixing tactical and technical. A great way to do that is simply toss in a decision point. Using the example above, after the beat sometimes the coach executes a counter parry or derobes the beat and the student reacts appropriately etc. The combinations are just about endless. You just have to walk that fine line between keeping the lesson a challenge for the student and having the student crash or get frustrated.

As someone once told me, being a fencing coach is like making cookies. The ingredients you use are often not very tasty in and of themselves, it is the art of mixing the ingredients and how they are combined that makes the wonderful tasty sweetness.

Is that the sort of thing you are looking for?

[jeff]

I'm a bit confused by the question: In addition to the "exactly what are you looking for?" and "what do you mean by classical?", which would have a lot of impact on the response, if you're being given teaching responsibilities by your instructor, wouldn't he or she help provide guidance on lesson plans and new drills? Doing this all on your own is deep water for someone fencing 3 years.

dichloro (great name, btw. what's the other part of the molecule?), I'm guessing that you're at Flagstaff Salle D'Escrime. If you're looking for more inputs, maybe drive down to Pat Waples' Salle D'Escrime Prescott.

[leapyear]

This was the "next step" in my classical foil training:

Do everything you've covered already, but in multiple parts, on an advance-lunge.

For example, you do an advance with a feint in four, begin to lunge with a disengage feint into six, and finish the lunge with a disengage-touch back in four. (This what my instructor called a one-two-three; and yes, I was taught to do the feint-disengage all in the lunge. You can modify the footwork according to what you have learned).

You continue these drills through all possible combinations: feint in four, feint-deceive counter-six, feint in six disengage-touch in four. Feint in four, feint-deceive counter-six, feint in six deceive counter-six finish in four, etc. There is obviously a huge number of combinations.

The same thing goes for all the pris-de-fer parries: Feint an opposition in four, then disengage around your opponent's ceding parry, finish in six. Feint a bind from four into eight, deceive your opponent's ceding parry, etc.

By the way, have you taught ceding parries? If not, this is actually the natural next step after pris-de-fer.

I spent a couple of years doing these drills twice week for 2 hours back when I was at the University of Illinois. Now that I do sport fencing, it's quite rare to use anything so complicated, but it's immensely satisfying when my opponent gives me the opportunity.

A final note:
My classical fencing training included lots of bladework, and an emphasis on the simple lunge and advance-lunge, but very little on controlling distance. Most any decent sport-fencing footwork drills would have been quite valuable.

[rudd]

I would suggest getting Fencing with the Foil by Roger Crosnier. It's a fantastic book for a classical fencer or any fencer for that matter. Lots of lesson plans.

[chinbeard]

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[schlager7]

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[Allen Evans]

We have had about eleven lessons....<snip>
.... We've covered simple attacks, all eight parries, ripostes, circle parries, disengages, feints, transports, glide attacks, beats, binds, every version of prise de faire I've read of, ballestras, and double lunges.

I can assure you that after only 11 lessons, your student may know the names of all of these things, but doesn't do them particularly well, can't do them at speed, and can't do them in a "tactical" progression of "question and answer".

[fatfencer]

Hello, everyone.

I was google searching "Classical foil drills," when I came upon this website. I found the forum and thought, "well this is perfect."

I have been fencing Italian foil for three years and have gotten to the point where my instructor decided that any new foil students who wanted lessons would get siphoned off to me. As it is, I only have one private student. We have had about eleven lessons and I'm getting to the point that I'm running out of drills (and my student seems to actually practice and have body awareness). Every once in a while I have a moment of brilliance in creating a drill of my own, but I am still a student myself.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

As a note, it's a left-against-right scenario, if drill suggestions need to be altered accordingly. We've covered simple attacks, all eight parries, ripostes, circle parries, disengages, feints, transports, glide attacks, beats, binds, every version of prise de faire I've read of, ballestras, and double lunges. (Please pardon my lack of French; my instructor is only now switching from the Italian tradition to the French for teaching.)

Any guidance is greatly appreciated!

Classical Italian fencing in Flag????? You must be kidding. Lemme guess, this is an outgrowth of that SCA 'school' that is up there.

Far from perfect, you will find that this forum loathes, I mean REALLY loathes classical fencing as opposed to modern sport fencing.

Regardless, you may want to purchase William Gaugler's book on teaching classical fencing. I forget what its called.

Nadi had some drills in the back of 'On Fencing'

Feel free to PM me if you need further help. I've been an armchair student of classical Italian Fencing and can PROBABLY, though not for certain, help you. I do not fence it but know something about it.

Fatfencer

PS: You may want to consider, for a moment, that classical fencing and modern sport fencing are not so different in terms of how a coach can give a lesson and what material is covered. Try the technical section of this forum. There some really good coaching there.

[mrbiggs]

I can assure you that after only 11 lessons, your student may know the names of all of these things, but doesn't do them particularly well, can't do them at speed, and can't do them in a "tactical" progression of "question and answer".

I was wondering when someone would post this. 11 lessons is NOT a long time, and the list of actions you've gone over is fairly large. I've been fencing for 7 years and in private lessons I'm rarely told to do anything more than one of several parries, disengages, and very simple footwork in different combinations. One of the most important things to realize about fencing is that nearly all actions are the same at the highest levels of fencing as they are at the lowest levels, they're just used more effectively.

Far from perfect, you will find that this forum loathes, I mean REALLY loathes classical fencing as opposed to modern sport fencing.

Self-fulfilling prophecy?

[fatfencer]

One cannot really fence Italian Classical Foil without 'the grip' and given how many threads I've participated in on the subject I think I can say quite truthfully that this forum hates both 'the grip' and the system... dare I use the word 'system' to describe what passes for Italian Classical here?

I mean AA Crown, Sullens, etc. EEK!!!!!

In otherwords I largely hate 'the system' but do have warm fuzzies about the grip.

FF

[sabreur]

Gaugler's book is called "The Science of Fencing: Blah, blah, blah."

http://www.amazon.com/Science-Fencin...3522955&sr=1-1