Tips on keeping distance?

[WoodsideDr]

I have been recently bouting foil with a fellow fencer who seemingly refuses to back up. He's extremely facile with his parries, making it difficult to use his proximity to my advantage.

In defense, I will retreat to regroup, but after much give and take, I end up dangerously close to the end of the piste.

Any pointers?

[a517dogg]

disengage and get around his parries. or draw his parry and coutnerparry riposte. then he'll have to stop running at you and you can set up your stuff.

[LKS_Blade]

Push forward and if he dosent move go past and hit him on the way though. Parrying preen (sp?) and riposte under ( thats kinda a hard one to explain properly) works well cos thier target is nice and close. Still, i agree witha517dogg, disengagements are the best option...

[jeff]

If he's good at defence, you need to improve your attacks - this is a good opportunity to develop these skills. Once your attacks are more dangerous, your opponent won't feel he can safely close distance on you.

In addition to the disengage attacks, make beat feints to threaten and disturb him. If he doesn't respond to the feints, learn to make them more convincing (deeper and faster). If a feint isn't convincing, a defender can just calmly wait till the real attack comes. Don't just beat the blade and let go - that never backs anyone up. Do a beat and follow it with a strong feint, and sometimes make the lunge so it's not predicable whether or not you're actually going to attack. - and vary the attack: beat followed by straight attack or by disengage, or one-two, and so on.

As already mentioned, you can also try second intention: make short attacks and pick up his riposte with your own counter riposte.

Good luck!

[KShan5[PrFC]]

feint...

[wflaschka]

a fellow fencer who seemingly refuses to back up. He's extremely facile with his parries

I used to have this problem often. If you're younger or more athletic, you can try adrenalin attacks. [a] Disguise your footwork and then fleche, going for a target far away from his hand (his hand will have to travel further to parry); [b] Sloppy attack to the chest, with your knuckles on top, bending your arm from the elbow, whip the blade around his deep parry; [c] Fast, committed lunge attack, feel his parry, and then immediate remise, leaning forward while still in the lunge -- if his riposte is indirect or slow you will get the touch.

If you can score this way, he will start giving ground. He's not giving ground because he's not threatened / respecting your attacks. That changes when you hit.

If the action starts from long distance, develop a marching attack with absence of blade. Remember -- you only have to threaten target to get the attack, not 'continuously extend the arm' so the other guy can parry it in space. A marching attack can be a sort of invitation to him to counter-attack, and if you finish it's your touch. Your mileage with directors may vary.

If you're evenly matched in bladework, try 2nd intention -- the death of all fast parries. Give him a committed-looking 1/2 lunge, receive his parry riposte during your fast recovery, and then be ready with your counter-parry riposte.

You can also lunge, take the parry, recover forward with a prime and step around him. He's immobile, after all, so you can get inside his point easily.

On the whole, it sounds like you need to get around the parries. Practice feints. Hand moves before body, thumb on top, disengage within the circumference of his belle garde, draw a reaction by attacking his high inside (not anywhere else), don't try to make circular disengage movements but V-shaped movements instead, like you're notching the air.

Good luck. As a hot young college fencer, 60 yr. old Albie Axlerod (ex olympian) used to regularly dissect me with nothing but a fast parry riposte.

[135711]

i want to help out on this, however, i do the same thing. it really ticks them off, it's like, why doesn't she retreat? it's makes them mad and they have to step back to renew an attack, but really, here's what i think is key: you [and me too] should be able to launch an attack from our standing positoin, so gather momentum and attack real strong on a valid target, make it land, and they'll have to rethink their strategy. It's to try to keep you moving back to the end of the strip, put pressure on you to make you make a mistake. i did that as a beginner because i had no other strategy.


'battle cry of the insane: sure i'll help you'

[a517dogg]

try point in line with disengage.

[Kling]

Well u need strong legs. If u have strong legs then try to make some false attacks ( make them to looks like reals ). when u see that he afraid from them ( your false attacks) make real attack. It work in epee so may be it will work in foil but u can try!

[Kling]

P.S

Point in line is very useful thing to stop his attacks

[fencingguy]

Parry...

if you beat/parry his blade and immediately take over he either retreats, or gets hit. Just make sure you land your point somewhere.

[Craig]

Originally posted by wflaschka
Good luck. As a hot young college fencer, 60 yr. old Albie Axlerod (ex olympian) used to regularly dissect me with nothing but a fast parry riposte.

Are you the Flaschka that fenced for NYU on their foil team?

[edew]

Flicks were invented to beat up on statues: those who can parry, but seem to have their legs bolted to the ground.

Slow march with arm constantly extending towards the opponent. Once you see him try to parry or extend the arm in a counter-attack, finish the flick and nail him where he can't parry, like the middle of the back or top of shoulder.

Throw in a feint before the flick so that even if he tries to parry the flick, you'll still get around.

Note that as long as he can successfully parry you and hit you, he's not obligated to retreat. So don't give him the blade to parry.

[wflaschka]

Uh oh...

Originally posted by webmaster
Are you the Flaschka that fenced for NYU on their foil team?

Hi, webmaster! Yes, that was me, a younger version of me, at least.

Do we know each other?

BTW -- I've watched fencing.net for a long time, and I'm very, very impressed with what you've done with it. And thankful.