Quote:
Originally posted by PeterGustafsson
In any sport, there at least 5 types of training:
1. technique drill
2. strength training
3. Cardiovascular training
4. mental training
5. match/game/bout simulation - free-fencing in our case
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As Ramrod points out, people expect a lot of immediate gratification. Sometimes they look at you as if you're withholding something, if they can't fence right away. After all, they signed up for
fencing, didn't they? How hard can it be? And, fencers who start fencing too soon often think, "There it is, I've fenced!" and they quit without knowing anything of the depths or intricacies of the sport. (Also, coaches know that new fencers who are thrust into bouting too soon, get lots of bad habits that can take years to fix.)
For myself, I'm trying to move away from the old ideal of "years of footwork before bouting." At our class, we try to include everything PeterGustafsson mentioned, but with the intent to fast-bake decent bouters.
The truth is, these 5 types of training intersect each other, so it's not an "either/or" situation.
20% Cardiovascular training -- Comes at the beginning of the class, when students jog around the building to warm up the muscles, before stretching. Cardio comes again during footwork. We also play games that develop endurance, balance and dexterity.
Strength training -- comes naturally with doing footwork and drills. The kind of muscles fencers need are best developed by doing fencing. Later, when competitive fencers need that extra edge, we bring up cross-training.
Mental training -- comes when fencers are at an intermediate level. At that time, the students are still unclear about what's happening to them, and have been beaten and humiliated on the strip. When the fencing-thinking is brought up, they are dying to hear it, and they understand its value. This is 1% of time, on a per-student basis.
30% Technique -- Group/partner drills have been the hardest to do. We teach young children, and they have no interest in guiding themselves. It can get quite chaotic at times. Since our class has 2 instructors, we can sooner move away from group drills and into 1-on-1 short lessons with each student. For the basics, we spend about 5% overall time in a semi-circle, going through the parries and extensions.
50% Bout / simulation -- We try to simulate real encounters at every step. For example, a partner drill or footwork might be the "Soviet Distance Exercises", described on this site. They are very realistic, but also improve cardio, strength, and footwork technique. When an instructor is leading footwork, we use body-language to communicate when to lunge, advance lunge, rather than shouting out the commands -- this lays the groundwork for fencing-thinking. Perhaps 40% simluation (drills, footwork, etc.) and 10% bouting.
After the first 4 classes, students begin bouting for the last 20 minutes of each class. Because of our methods (I hope), the kids are pretty rational for brand-new fencers. But we've only been doing this for the last year, and it's too soon to say what the results are. I think we've uncovered one gifted 9-year-old, and 2-3 others who will be quite solid if/when they decide to fence seriously. Too many of these children are simply not competitive -- they hate losing, but they don't try to win. Has it always been this way!?
Interestingly, the children often see bouting as another
task rather than the
reward. This may be because we do little fencing-thinking, and they are frustrated when they don't understand what to do to win. We may try to spend more early time on fencing-thinking, but the kids have so much energy they don't really listen to talk.
We need ideas to make bouting more fun for kids.
(the ones who want to stay after or come early are usually the ones we want to encourage anyway since they're likely to keep it up and join the club). Classes are generally held twice a week for six weeks.
--this takes up most of the rest of the class. The last five minutes or so we do practice bouting. Basically two lines, everyone bouts against the person across from them, one line moves over one person then bouts their new partner. The first couple times are pretty free form. We try to emphasize that the point is to hit your opponent. Right of way, parries and disengages come into play as they are learned. Students are encouraged to practice the new techniques during their bouts. How much this occurs varies. I know when I was a beginner I just tried to win a lot of the time, other than to see if I could fake out my opponent. Now if I'm mixing in with the beginner class, I try to work on whatever the "new move of the day" is. I also try to offer invitations--non-verbal of course--to try the moves they've just learned.
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