2002 World Championships Tapes are here!

[edew]

Ok, so guess what I got on my doorstep yesterday? A set of eight tapes. That's a lot (last year was 7, Olympics was 10, previous years were 4 or 5).

I only went through a small portion of them. Here are some comments from what I've seen:

* Looks like the clear lexan mask idea is done. Stick a fork in it.

* Wireless fencing with scoring lights on mask? Useless for TV. Maybe the live audience could get it. The reel cord is usually very thin and almost can't be seen on TV anyway, so it's not a distraction that causes novices to ask, "What's that wire dangling behind his butt?" The lights on the mask are not bright enough to be seen on TV (that is, it has to shine through the metal mesh and it doesn't come out very clearly). The automatic lights projected onto the TV is much better, and this time, it's easier to see than last year's graphics.

* In the women's epee gold medal individuals bout, somehow, the audio feed with the Swedish commentators died and James Chambers' (or whoever that British commentator is) voice-over came on. And sure enough, for a bit of attack/counter-attack (both lights went on), it was "parried riposted and the remise hit as well..." Whatever. I swear, you can get much better analysis with the Swedish commentator, even if you don't know a word of Swedish.

* Laura Flessel-Colovic dyed her hair blonde. Looks like Serena Williams (or is it Venus?).

* While Pozdniakov was unbeatable in the individuals and team at the 2002 Worlds, I'm predicting his reign is soon over. He won't medal at Athens 2004 (but teammate Frossine may). On the other hand, I will predict some major changes in who the powerhouses will be by 2004: the asian countries. China and Korea will be the two big powerhouses in fencing. We'll see, eh? While I'm here passing judgement, hey, did Luigi Tarantino put on a spare tire or what? And when is Peter Erdei going to stop blowing calls? I think I've seen some 1988 Olympics tapes with Erdei refereeing. I'm thinking he's passed his prime.

* I'm beginning to like the new way they present the TV viewing: looking from behind the referee into the live audience. Previous WCs and the Olympics had the audience and the referee seeing the same view, so the background was nothing but a blank wall or plain emptiness.

* The women's foil gold medal individuals between Youcheva and Bojko was, erm, rather uninspiring. The final score was 4-3, with 1-1 after first period, 2-2 after the second, and 3-3 after the third. There were whistling and cat-calls from the gallery, but they didn't do the Meelis Loit statue play. They just attacked like they've been fencing for all of six months: incredibly short distance lunges which, if it could actually hit something, might hit the elbow (maybe they're planning to transition into epee?). And no distance parry ripostes at all.

* The men's foil gold medal individuals was a blow out by Vanni. Wessels fenced like Adam Kryzsenski against Guyart in last year's team match. Wessels is this big tall German and he wielded his weapon very heavily. His footwork was too tentative as well. He looked out of place there and Vanni just tore him apart.

* The most exciting bouts were, ironically (to some people), the epee bouts. The semi-finals between Kolobkov and Ku from Korea was quite good, and the gold between Kolobkov and Jeannet of Frannce was excellent, going down to 14-13 or so. Very good fencing. The women's individual gold between Duplitzer and Hyun Hee of Korea was fantabulous. People usually dismiss epee as boring, but these bouts showed some really good fencing actions. Hyun was noticeably fast in her lunge. Bounce, bounce, bounce, BAM! and her lunge nailed Duplitzer mainly by catching Duplitzer off guard. Near the end, Duplitzer regained some momentum by shear will to press Hee. Pushed Hee back to the end of the strip and got three hits back, but then Hee retook the dominance and fought Duplitzer off for the gold. A very exciting match. As contrasted to:

* Women's sabre still has a way to go before it can be telegenic (or just watchable). Maybe it's the "high-level" women's sabre, as opposed to, say, regional level women's sabre. In regional women's sabre, there's actually some attempt to parry and maybe, once in a while, a counter-parry. Here at the "high-level", it was nothing more than simultaneous attacks and hope that the opponent was stupid enough to attack into the bellguard. There were no (decent) parries to speak off. Even the distance parry was virtually gone because neither fencer was willing to rely on her retreat footwork. There were very few attempts to stop-cut to the arm of an advancing opponent (basically because both were advancing). It's nice that the Chinese fencer won, only because it validates which is the master race, but besides stating the obvious, it was a pretty forgettable bout. Further, Jemaeva *****ed and moaned after every light, regardless whether it was against her or not. And her celebratory antics were not commensurate with the sloppy luck hits she got. Same goes for the chinese fencer, Xue Tan.

* The director (Eurosport television director, not the referee) seemed to like the close-up camera shots of pretty girls in the stands. No uppies, though. I think our own Kristin Follmer-Suchorski was captured sitting in the stands mulling over why she's not down there. Answer: American fencers, epeeists in particular, are too lazy with the legs. We just don't move as much as the fencers in the gold medal bouts, and don't move as fast (when needed), either. That's a hint to get MOVING!

* It was nice to see the medal ceremonies, as that part usually rarely get shown, even in the Olympics tapes.

* I plan to make edits as I have with previous tapes. I plan to also use 3-hour tapes instead of 2, to capture as much of the "dead-time" between "halt" and "fence". Previously, I edited out those dead-times. What transpired in those dead-times were usually slow-mo of the last scoring touch. This time, however, they show more of the phrase that led to the touch, not just the last arm-extension, and they sometimes showed them from multiple angles. I think they are much more worthwhile. I also wish to be more pro-active with helping push the cause to better Peter G's son's condition. As some of you may have read in Peter Gustafsson's singular post here on fencing.net, and my several posts on the subject, Peter's son, Thomas, was born with some severe deformity in the upper palate. (I'll let Peter spell out the details if he desires to. I'll never be able to get the facts all right anyway.)
Anyway, some people who have donated last year have emailed me saying that they would like me to do something to get donations made out. I like to, but don't quite have the wherewithal to do so. One person suggested that I contact the various divisions and ask that they all hold a "charity" tournament with most of the proceeds going to Peter's son's surgery costs. I don't know how easy it is to do that, as some divisions (like ours in Northern California) are quite packed with competition, and adding another is virtually impossible. Maybe we can do it next season, although with us and others, the thought and the desire might drop.

That said, because of the additional tape time (3-hours instead of 2), I will be charging a bit extra per tape. And, I will be actively seeking people's help to donate as they did last year. Last year, I only asked for donations early on, and didn't follow up during subsequent mentions about the availability of the tapes. But I will have that request featured prominently on the tape-order sheet.

I will do the editing over the next week+, and then will take pre-orders before heading out to the duplicator. I'm really tight on money at the moment (as are all those other fellow un-employed), so I'm not able to drop a big chunk of change for duplication before getting the accounts receivable.

I'll post some more reviews of the actions as I see them.

[Tomas N]

Eric,

What's the quality of the tapes this year? The last WC's tapes were a bit fuzzy. (but a lot better than nothing, I'm not complaining!) I have no idea about reproduction costs, but is it cheaper to burn a dvd nowadays or make tapes?

Look forward to seeing them.

Tomas

[edew]

Originally posted by Tomas N
Eric,

What's the quality of the tapes this year? The last WC's tapes were a bit fuzzy. (but a lot better than nothing, I'm not complaining!) I have no idea about reproduction costs, but is it cheaper to burn a dvd nowadays or make tapes?

Look forward to seeing them.

Tomas

There's plenty of color bleeding, and there's some fuzziness (and technical difficulties, as with the audio change from Swedish to English-amateur), but I can't really tell how good or bad the eventual copy one gets will be because there will be multiple edits and duplications. The epees are clear and distinctive, but the sabres and foils are sometimes washed away in the background. Certainly, as I said, the reel wire is virtually invisible.

[edew]

Just watched the men's foil team bout. Germany kicked some major-league *** against the french. It was total domination. Unfortunately, it could also mean that it's not as exciting a show as it could be if the scores were tighter. Same with the men's sabre match, with a tremendous bias for the Russians.

Some more off-the-cuff comments:

* The camera director really overdid the cute-girl-in-the-stands shots. I mean, let's tone it down a bit eh? (Guess Robin Williams wasn't there as celebrity spectator or something.) (See if you can find a Monica Lewinsky in there...)

* Lars Schache of Germany will be the big player by 2004. Look for him to make top-4 in Athens 2004. Wessels still has this funky galloping walk for an advance. It works well for him, though. And his windmill attacks just scared the $h1t out of the french fencers.

* Interesting commericals. I will add them if I can.

As for the format, I'm thinking of doing the MF/WS, ME/WF, MS/WE deal as last year, but just for the teams. I think I can fit the six gold medal bouts for the individual finals into one tape. I'll see if I can include the medal ceremonies portion for each one of them as well. It really is refreshing to see an non-American flag fly in some international competition. You know what I mean (no disrespect for the Old Glory, but), there are few international competitions being aired on US telecasts. And the few would show nothing but those intolerable up-close-and-personal BS and when there are medal ceremonies shown, well, it's just the US winners. It's nice to see other countrymen mouth their country's anthem. It's nice to see a flag with gold or green in it.

Well, hope you guys like the play-by-play.

[Peach]

Love the play-by-play! I've fenced some of the top women's sabre fencers and I agree about the simplicity of what they're doing--but they whup me good because of their speed and athleticism.

Frankly, charity tournaments rarely raise as much money as you'd think and are a pain to boot. I'd be up for donating to a fund, though.

Looking forward to hearing when the tapes are available.

[edew]

Watched a bit more of the tapes. Watched the men's epee team finals and the women's foil team finals.

Apparently, Eurosport is in cahoots with the FIE to downgrade women's foil. WF Team gold medal between Russia and Poland was given a very short shrift. Only two of the bouts were shown. The first one was at 20-18 in favor of Poland, with Gruchala fencing Bojko. Bojko came back to win 25-20 in that bout. Then we cut to a commercial and when we returned, we got the last bout starting at 38-30 or something like that with Gruchala against Yuchaeva.

I'm guessing, given the eurosport director's propensity for televising cute looking girls, that they focussed on Gruchala because she's quite a babe. (I noticed at the Modern Pentathlon World Championships this past June that the Polish female athletes were definitely the best looking of the bunch.) Still, I think the eurosport director is overdoing the glam shots. Virtually all spectator shots consisted of some attractive woman or two in the stands. Sure, I like to see a good looking face here and there, but the lingering camera shots seems definitely pathetic and borders on stalking.

The men's epee team match starts at 4-4 with Kotse<...>ov against Jeannet, then Obry and Seline, then Jeannet against Kolobkov, then some fuzzy connection (which I'll delete) at 35-30 or so, and then we go to the last bout with Jeannet against Seline (which I thought was weird, I'd figure Kolobkov would be the Russian anchor).

Unfortunately, Russia was behind by 5 or so points at the start of the last bout, and ends up losing by 12 or so points. That's the nature of epee, I guess.

Given the mediocrity of the WFT and MET, I might just add them to other team matches (since they don't appear to take too long) and make one fewer tape. I'm still inclined to put all individual gold medal bouts onto one tape, and if possible, add the semi-final between Kolobkov and Ku in that as well. We'll see.

There are other sports shown in the tapes, with some track and field, some soccer (duh), some kayaking, and tennis. And there's this recurring commerical with a woman in a dry-cleaning store arguing with the asian launderer about some funky looking leopard-print BVDs. Is the chinese laundry person stereotype international? I thought it was restricted to just the US, and the West Coast (from the Gold Rush days, of course) in particular.

Overall, despite my desire to get fencers to see more fencing, and to help out Peter G, I have to say that the fencing in this year's WC is mostly dull with only sparks of excitement (Women's Epee -- who woulda thunk!). The telecast director obviously interned with Seymore Butts or someone like that prior to working for Eurosport. Kinda hard to make impassioned pleas to get this year's tapes without being personally impassioned.

If I had to make suggestions, the men's foil team is a good one to watch, if anything, to see how to defeat people like Guyart/Attelly as well as Wessels/Schache (I'm guessing Bissdorf will relinquish his dominant role in German fencing before 2004).

If you fencers need to know how to beat Sylwia Gruchala (for NCAAs, for example), get the women's team foil tape: it'll show you clearly what Gruchala's weaknesses are, and there are plenty.

The men's epee individual bouts are definitely worth seeing. There's technique and tactics that one can clearly see as the bout transpires. The women's epee individuals (and team, too) are worth it for the techniques. I think Michael Marx should get some funding to purchase tapes for all US women epeeists. They need to see what they're not doing (well, or at all).

The sabre matches have gone to seed. Does anyone know how to counter-parry anymore? Worse, the referees seemed to sometimes pull calls right out of their 4$$es. Here's one suggestion to improve sabre: use an extended foil lame for the target (together with the head, of course). Cut it at the waist like the current sabre target, but get rid of the target on the weapon arm up to past the elbow. Make a sleeve 20cm from the shoulder down on the weapon side, and sleeve all the way down to the wrist on the non-weapon side. All those mousey cuts to the wrist makes for dull fencing. Tightening up the target area will make for more blade engagement.

In the women's sabre bouts (and to a large degree at the local fencing level), there's no tactic or technique: just flail away near the bell guard and hope one of them smacks hard and lucky enough to set off the light.

It would be a worthwhile effort for some sabre clubs to experiment with different target areas. See what works and what doesn't. Maybe my suggestions won't work, but it'll be worthwhile to try. Because right now, sabre fencing on television is dull as molasses.

[Jason]

Originally posted by edew
I'm guessing, given the eurosport director's propensity for televising cute looking girls, that they focussed on Gruchala because she's quite a babe. (I noticed at the Modern Pentathlon World Championships this past June that the Polish female athletes were definitely the best looking of the bunch.)

It's not limited to the athletes.
Polish girls are HOT (where's that guy who wanted pictures of babes in fencing?).

More from edew
Here's one suggestion to improve sabre: use an extended foil lame for the target (together with the head, of course). Cut it at the waist like the current sabre target, but get rid of the target on the weapon arm up to past the elbow. Make a sleeve 20cm from the shoulder down on the weapon side, and sleeve all the way down to the wrist on the non-weapon side. All those mousey cuts to the wrist makes for dull fencing. Tightening up the target area will make for more blade engagement.

[...]

Maybe my suggestions won't work, but it'll be worthwhile to try. Because right now, sabre fencing on television is dull as molasses.

It seems from what you've written that you're basing your suggestions for improving sabre on what would help it look better on TV.
I can't disagree that sabre isn't what it could be, but shouldn't televisability be secondary on any list of criteria for judging the quality of fencing?
Obviously, identifying what is "wrong" with sabre (or foil, mind you) has to start with why it is "wrong". But, if TV is our guide ("this is bad because it doesn't look good on television"), then we'll all be swinging from chandeliers after a while.

But then, I, personally, can't begin to imagine criteria that everyone would agree on...

[D'Artagnan1673]

It would be impossible to find criteria that everone would like. This board would be as war torn as Ireland.

[edew]

Originally posted by Jason
It's not limited to the athletes.
Polish girls are HOT (where's that guy who wanted pictures of babes in fencing?).



It seems from what you've written that you're basing your suggestions for improving sabre on what would help it look better on TV.
I can't disagree that sabre isn't what it could be, but shouldn't televisability be secondary on any list of criteria for judging the quality of fencing?
Obviously, identifying what is "wrong" with sabre (or foil, mind you) has to start with why it is "wrong". But, if TV is our guide ("this is bad because it doesn't look good on television"), then we'll all be swinging from chandeliers after a while.

But then, I, personally, can't begin to imagine criteria that everyone would agree on...

Spectator appeal is certainly a MAJOR criterium for determining what is "right" or "wrong" with a sport. The FIE certainly has its hands in trying to improve the sport with useless ideas like lexan masks, reel-less connectivity (eg, the lights on masks in the sabre...totally useless for the television), passivity rule, one-minute break after the 8th touch, allowing fencers to remove masks after the halt (previously, one must ask the referee -- er, director, then -- for permission to remove one's mask), and many other changes.

Some have certainly been for the better, few have done absolutely nothing but waste time and money (usually, the technological changes, like the lock-out timing and such).

What's wrong with sabre now is that it doesn't appear to be what people's perception of sabre is: thwack, thwack with plenty of parries and ripostes. One reason is because the target is too large. Why parry when it's much easier to hit something. The result is watching two people play a game of slap..without turns.

One other possibility is to thicken the blade, not along the edge but along the side of the blade. With a thicker blade, waving it side to side will be more difficult (aerodynamics), thus making multiple feints a more difficult action, requiring the fencer to make the attack sooner. That means it'll be easier for the defender to see the attack and make the appropriate parry.

Another is to give two points for a parry riposte, three for a counter-parry riposte. People may chance it to get three points if they can make a successful counter-parry riposte.

Basically, what's wrong with sabre is that there's little blade engagement, there's virtually no metal-on-metal parries, and thus, very little tactical changes needed during the course of a bout.

I think the referees should also go back (in time) a bit to allow for more wind-up for the attack. Now, it really is "who extends fastest" that wins, as opposed to "who extends first" (in the foil sense). "Who extends first" will discourage more stop-cuts, especially to the arm area, and forces people to parry.

I just want to see more parry ripostes for sabre.

[damianip]

Eric,

You want more parry-ripostes in sabre? I don't think you're watching carefully enough:

Ask James Chambers, he'll tell you about parry-riposte!


Paolo

[veeco]

Originally posted by edew
Another is to give two points for a parry riposte, three for a counter-parry riposte. People may chance it to get three points if they can make a successful counter-parry riposte.

That would:

1- Make it harder to explain.
2- Give more leniency to the referee in their possibility to alter the outcome of a bout based on their perceptions: was that a beat attack or a parry riposte?

[edew]

Well, if the offensive action included blade contact, that would be a beat-attack, and thus, one point. If the offensive action did not, but the counter-offensive action did, then it's a parry riposte and thus gets two points. Of course, I think I get the gist of what you're saying: the fencers will make actions that look like parry ripostes and probably muck up the action even worse so that the spectators will be even more confused.

Maybe I'll settle for Paolo's suggestion: just get an announcer who calls everything parry-ripostes and voila, you got your parry ripostes in spades!

[epeemike81]

Originally posted by D'Artagnan1673
It would be impossible to find criteria that everone would like. This board would be as war torn as Ireland.

Ahem. I am going to assume you meant to say "as war torn as NORTHERN Ireland." The Republic is quite tranquil, thank you. Also, I should think you would be able to find some MUCH more war torn places in the world. Chechnya and Israel, just to name a few.

-m

[Inquartata]

I love the way most of the kvetching about sabre and the suggestions for changing it seem to come from those who don't fence it.

Personally, I find it plenty exciting to fence and fun to watch, and would object most vigorously to restricting the target any further. Is there a different dynamic to it than to the other weapons? Yes. Is that a reason to try to make it more like foil? No.

[Peach]

I agree. Well put.

[edew]

Well, I do fence it quite a bit. I probably make the majority of parry ripostes in any tournament (heheh). Sabre now is basically who can steal time over the other fencer. Nevermind any aspect of "real duel" where both fencers would have their heads cloven in two, there's absolutely no effort by either fencer to defend himself. It's just who can move first. But unlike foil (or even epee), moving first doesn't necessarily get one the light, because the opponent is likely to make a parry, moving first in sabre virtually guarantees a light. Or at least no worries about being parried for the most part. Actually, medium-level sabre fencing is quite exciting to watch because there are parries and counter-parries. But at the high level, apparently, the risk in attempting a parry far outweighs the benefits of getting a light. Or at least that seems to be the impression. Feel free to purchase a copy and tell me I'm wrong (guerilla marketing?)

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

Eric Dew wrote:

>Ok, so guess what I got on my doorstep yesterday? A set of >eight tapes.

I asked my parents to tape all reruns, thus the large number.


* In the women's epee gold medal individuals bout, somehow, the audio feed with the Swedish commentators died and James Chambers' (or whoever that British commentator is) voice-over came on. And sure enough, for a bit of attack/counter-attack (both lights went on), it was "parried riposted and the remise hit as well..." Whatever. I swear, you can get much better analysis with the Swedish commentator, even if you don't know a word of Swedish.

This is something that I have often wondered about. Are there any tape-buyers out there with access to a translator Swedish->English? For the rest, do you try to make out what Nils Koppang says, or do you just look at the tapes with the sound turned off?

* Laura Flessel-Colovic dyed her hair blonde. Looks like Serena Williams (or is it Venus?).

Just happened to look at Eurosport WTennis, and saw an interview with the sisters. It is Serena.

* <snip>And when is Peter Erdei going to stop blowing calls? I think I've seen some 1988 Olympics tapes with Erdei refereeing. I'm thinking he's passed his prime.

Who is that? It is the big burly blond guy who look like he would be typecast as a german officer in a WWII movie?

* I'm beginning to like the new way they present the TV viewing: looking from behind the referee into the live audience. Previous WCs and the Olympics had the audience and the referee seeing the same view, so the background was nothing but a blank wall or plain emptiness.

I prefer bank wall - tastes differ.

* <snip> It's nice that the Chinese fencer won, only because it validates which is the master race, but besides stating the obvious, it was a pretty forgettable bout.

Perfectly objective, are we? (Dang, why does the smilie not work??)

Personally, I would wager that the total number of WC and Olympic medals won by people of african heritage outnumber those won by people of asian heritage. I guess that P.Westbrooks MS Olympic bronze would be countewd 0.5-0.5 in that particular competition ;-)

* The director (Eurosport television director, not the referee) seemed to like the close-up camera shots of pretty girls in the stands.

A personal peeve of mine. I want to look at fencing, if I would like to look at scantily clad women there is an entire department devoted to that in every place that hires out tapes :-(

* I plan to make edits as I have with previous tapes. I plan to also use 3-hour tapes instead of 2, to capture as much of the "dead-time" between "halt" and "fence". Previously, I edited out those dead-times. What transpired in those dead-times were usually slow-mo of the last scoring touch.

Well, you missed some interesting facts when you deleted the chit-chat between the 2 commentators during the Olympics 2000 tapes.

I also wish to be more pro-active with helping push the cause to better Peter G's son's condition. As some of you may have read in Peter Gustafsson's singular post here on fencing.net, and my several posts on the subject, Peter's son, Thomas, was born with some severe deformity in the upper palate. (I'll let Peter spell out the details if he desires to. I'll never be able to get the facts all right anyway.)

Well, here comes. (I hope that the webmaster will indulge me this time for posting off-topic stuff.)

Thomas has:
1. Total and bilateral (doublesided) cleft of the upper lip
2. Total and bilateral cleft of the upper jaw
3. Total cleft of the palate, reaching from the jaw cleft to the uvula
4. Short tounge-band, which limits his ability to learn speech
5. Hypertelerorism - extreme distance between the eyes (see pictures of Oprah Winfrey as a child)

Should you be interested, #1-3 are dealt with on a support webpage, www.widesmiles.org. #4 will be fixed next operation. #5 requires a very large skull operation to move the eyes together, but we heard that it may grow away by itself if he is lucky, and in any case one can wit until his skull has reached final size - age 23 or so.

He will need 10 or so operations to fix #1-3, the 4th one is due in 2 weeks time. I have a flu right now, and he is coughing. The doctor told us that they would not do anything about it - saying that this is the stuff that one should let take its course - , and more or less threw me out of there. Any bona fide MD. out there who has any suggestion on how to knock the hell out of a flu - fast? If he is sniveling when operation day comes around, they wont operate hime and there will be further delays. :-(

Anyway, some people who have donated last year have emailed me saying that they would like me to do something to get donations made out. I like to, but don't quite have the wherewithal to do so. One person suggested that I contact the various divisions and ask that they all hold a "charity" tournament with most of the proceeds going to Peter's son's surgery costs.

This is soo nice of you. If, however, it is like peach indicates, it is too much work for the bang, well then don´t overdo it.

Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson