A bit confused

[pammie003]

After this past weekend at RMC, my coach told me I need to attack more. Fine, this I know. I'm notorious for creating an opening and then not taking it. Yesterday at practice however, I wanted to talk to him about it more, get more specific if you will. I told him I thought I had figured out why I do this, after thinking about it all week. His response: you think too much. Just fix it.

This is why I'm confused. To me, an essential part of correcting the problem is understanding why I have it in the first place. Am I overanalyzing?

Oh, the reason I came up with is 2-fold:
1) I worry too much about getting hit and not enough about hitting. I like to play it too safe. Easy enough to start to fix know that I know I do it.
2) The girls here are shorter than I'm used to, and consequently have a lower blade position in their engarde. I have trouble attacking into this and usually resort to a straight attack to the arm to provoke them into raising it a bit during the action. However, this does not always work. Any thoughts on this one?

[Fechter1]

Aaah, the old problem of putting theory into practice. You're right that identifying the problem is important, but it is just the first step. The biggest trap here is the Nike attitude, "just do it". Your coach is right. Just fix it. Unfortunately, this is where the real work begins. You have to train yourself to put ideas into actions. That's why we fence practice bouts. If you want to send practice just fencing, that's up to you but you're not going to learn much. Instead, try working on specific parts of your game (triggering your attack to specific opponent moves, drawing and the exploiting openings, etc). You can help this by applying 'controls' to the bouts (i.e. imiting the moves that can score a touch).

Hope that helps.

[azfencer]

Thinking too much really can be a problem, especially if you do the thinking while you're fencing. Your coach probably means you need to just REACT to the openings instead of overthinking exactly what you should be doing. By the time you think about the appropriate action the opportunity is usually gone. Don't worry too much about doing the exact right attack, just recognize when you should attack (or riposte) and try to start the attack as quickly as you can after that recognition.

[labouche]

Originally posted by pammie003
1) I worry too much about getting hit and not enough about hitting. I like to play it too safe. Easy enough to start to fix know that I know I do it.

If you worry too much about getting hit, it probably means you don't have enough confidence in yourself. I used to have that problem. At practice you should get used to doing big long attacks. Even if you get hit on it, it will give you more confidence in you attack.
-La Bouche

[MyraTrue]

Pammie, you're coach sounds like mine! *tearing out hair*

I get "less talk, more fencing", or "less thinking, more fencing!" yelled at me all the time. I guess I'm the type of fencer who needs to wrap my brain firmly around any idea to be able to physically execute it. "Just do it" doesn't work well for me. But I try. And I've realized if I stop thinking he's gonna kill me for doing wrong, I just come back enguard and do it again, and again, until he thinks its right.

I sympathize, and I'm looking for an answer too! Oh, and I. Oh well. I fence... therefore

[Inquartata]

Yeah, this can be a problem. Lots of coaches either (a) don't understand that different individuals learn in different ways, ie the curt pithy injunction works fine for some while others need a lot of explanation, others need to "teach" the technique to themselves, etc; or (b) cover up a discomfort with or lack of knowledge about HOW to explain a technique by resorting to the inscrutable phrase.

Maybe you can get one of the more advanced fencers to go into a bit more detail with you if your coach is the laconic sort...

[morael]

I think... that it's not thinking that's the problem. It's what you're thinking. It might help to stick this in your mind:
Don't lose your head when you parry! Keep on!

[Feanor]

If you're worrying about getting hit, you're halfway to getting hit...

[I_luv_saber]

Well, if you KNOW what you have to do, and are just having trouble putting it into practice, I recommend finding a good fencer who's willing to drill with you. Drill over and over and over and over, until it is burned into you're brain. It always works for me anyway, so you might give it a shot.

[MikeHarm]

I think that you should think about attacking when you have the advantage, like if the opponent won't retreat or you've figured out their parry system and have a decieve that will get through it.

Just 'attacking more' when its not set up and your opponent is in guard proper is a recipe for disaster.

Also if he's shouting at you to attack while you're fencing your opponents will key into it and start setting you up with countertime actions.

On the guard bit, I think you should learn angulated attacks and/or flick actions. They'll never be fully safe in guard once you learn them. You can switch back and forth, down the center with tight disengages/coupes/circular deceives if they use wide parries, or switch to flanking actions right around their tight parries if they use those instead. Its a great way to play with someones head.

[The0ne]

Try and use like feint disengage, or one-two attacks ALOT. People will begin to score on you alot more than normal, as you work out the timing and quickness required for them but once you have the basic feint attacks down, you will have a whole other game to add to your arsenal.

[pammie003]

Some good suggestions here, thanks guys. I feel I should say 1 thing. He doesn't want me to fix it because I'm not winning, but rather because I'm the type that always needs to be working on something *shrug*. I am definitely trying to fence more bouts at practice, but the opposition is limited. As for Inq.'s suggestion about going to the more advanced fencers, well, there really aren't any. There are a few at the same level, but that only goes so far...

I seem to have been slightly sucessful this past weekend at Brock. I beat a few people whose styles I normally would have had difficulty with (those who fence like I do). I'll keep working on it.