Footwork Treachery

[FoilyGeezer]

As an aside to Walter's thread on pattern footwork, for the past few months I've been experimenting with some drills that expand on the standard advance/retreat/lunge moves in order to work them into my fencing.

My premise is that you can use footwork, to deceive your opponent by achieving essentially one of two objectives. To make your opponent think that you'll be in one place when s/he attacks when in fact you'll be in another place. Or to make your opponent think that you're not launching a viable attack when you are.

The footwork drill I've been using is a combination of standard moves adding in a false advance or retreat. That is, movement of the front foot either closer to or futher from the back foot (as if one were retreating or advancing) without moving the back foot, and vice versa (moving the back foot with the front foot stationary). The idea is to present the illusion that your position on the strip is changing when in fact you're just moving your feet a bit further apart or closer together.

Has anyone ever tried to teach or been taught this formally? Empirically, it seems to be a valid tactic, as I can generally achieve either 1) some degree of succesful manipulation of my opponent's position relative to mine; or 2) a shift in my center of gravity over my legs differently which allows me to set up something unexpected.

[WJM]

email Mike Marx (Northwest Fencing Center, OR division) about footwork drills involving what he (and others) call "check steps". Which is another way of referring to half-advances and retreats combined with other footwork patterns. There's others you could talk to, but I believe he'll be more likely to send you training material about that subject...unless he's close to publishing yet. It's nothing earth-shattering, a simple example would be half-advance into a retreat, where you put the front foot forward, then push off of it, for a retreat. I personally don't teach this, not because it's not useful, just that fencers tend to do this on their own without anybody telling them to, as long as you make them do a lot of distance keeping/stealing drills.

[jBirch]

Foily,

I assume that you're familiar with reverse and half-lunges, appells and half-steps? Is it patterns you're looking for or techniques?

Take it easy.

[FoilyGeezer]

Originally posted by jBirch
I assume that you're familiar with reverse and half-lunges, appells and half-steps?

Yes, and I guess technically these would be appells and reverse appells, though this falls somewhere between that and a half step since you actually are changing distance slightly, but generally an appell I associate with the initial move of a sequence, whereas the whole point to this is to put it in the middle.

i.e. I make four retreats in nice measured steps to your advances, keeping you just out of range. You make a fifth advance and I move my back foot about six inches making it look like the expected fifth retreat. It's not, and now you're in distance but don't know it yet.

Is it patterns you're looking for or techniques?

Techniques more than patterns. I'm trying to qualify this because it's something most fencers do to some degree anyway, but it's ofen done without consideration and not as a tactic.

[neevel]

There's also variations in the size and or tempo of your steps that can be woven in to whatever pattern you're creating. For example, set up an iteration of the pattern where one of the steps is sharp, quick but small, and on the next iteration replace it with a slower but longer step-- your opponent may be fooled by the slower tempo and not pick up on the greater distance.

A very handy tool for getting opponents to mis-read the finish of your action is a "hanging" or two-tempo lunge. You initiate the lunge with the hand and kick the front foot, but instead of immediately doing a full acceleration into the lunge at the instant the front foot clears the floor you either let it hang there for a half-tempo or start with a slow push from the back leg, and then accelerate after your opponent responds to the intial tempo.
This is just one example of how you can make tempo changes within actions, rather than between actions. It's naturally useful on the defence as well: your opponent initiates an attack, you begin a retreat at one tempo, which draws out the continuation of the attack adjusted for that tempo, and then you make a quick acceleration mid-retreat.

-Dave

[jBirch]

Foily,

Yeah, ok what you're looking for are technically called checksteps. Tactically, you put them together by showing your opponent the same thing a couple of times, then use it to draw the desired reaction which you capitalize. Tempo changes also help in the same regard, fast, slow, slow, slow, fast. Keep in mind the tactical wheel though: you don't want to get too complicated with your patterns.

I actually got hit once with an increadibly slow hand extension that I was trying to do second intention parry riposte on. Stupid hit, but I had been set up for a fast extension that the slow one just slid straight by and I got caught. With regards to tempo, fast is threatening, slow is safe.

The whole point of footwork variances is to create either the perception of threat [edit] the perception of opportunity [/edit] or the perception of safety when the reverse is true. Think of them like footwork feints and it might get easier. In fact, that's a good way to think of it: anything you do with your blade to create advantage, you can do with footwork too. What's the advantage of keeping your blade in motion? What's the disadvantage? How do you use that knowledge to take advantage of your opponent?

Hope this helps.

[laughingduelist]

Vladimir Nazlymov and the rest of the Russians coaches at Ohio State University teach this sort of movement.

[FoilyGeezer]

Originally posted by jBirch
I actually got hit once with an increadibly slow hand extension that I was trying to do second intention parry riposte on. Stupid hit, but I had been set up for a fast extension that the slow one just slid straight by and I got caught. With regards to tempo, fast is threatening, slow is safe.

Checksteps. Yes that helps quite a bit. Thanks.

One move that seems to reap more points than it should for me is a delayed riposte. At the finish of the parry I make every attempt to show the initiation of a ripost in tempo, then I hesitate. Often this leaves an opponent lost at sea since there's nothing to parry, and while they're shifting mental gears to attack mode I pop the riposte in.

[swordsen]

These actions are a pretty standard part of the curriculum at the Coaches College. they work well too.

[sabreur]

Two useful footwork variations:

1. The distance gained in a lunge is primarily determined by where your back foot is. So... in the advance-lunge, bring your back foot right up to your front heel during the advance--this gains about 18 inches during the lunge and if executed correctly is very difficult for your opponent to perceive. You can also do this during preparation (ie., a series of advances, ballestras, etc.) to gain distance--the interesting thing about this is that you do not gain the distance on the first advance, but set yourself up to gain it on the following movement (advance, lunge, whatever).

2. A slide step. The Russian sabreurs use this a lot. You advance, then sort of raise your heels a bit and slide forward--the movement is similar to what you would do if you were trying to slide on an icy sidewalk--it's not a jump, and your center of gravity should not rise. You gain a little distance, but what this really does is give you about a half or quarter tempo to play with. I find it very useful when trying to steal time in what would normally be a simultaneous attack situation...

Cheers, MR

[FoilyGeezer]

Thanks guys, my thought was that I don't want to re-invent the wheel if there was already something in place. Or teach something that had no practical use.

That being said, due to a broken ankle (and the resulting limits on my range of motion) some years ago on my back foot, I've gotten pretty creative with playing with changes in stance, and arm position to help compensate for not being able to shift and launch quite the same way I used to be able to.

Its only been lately that I've started to try and quantify some of these tactics in order to pass them on to some of the potential future talent.

[The0ne]

My favorite deceiving footwork idea is taking several large advances, giving your opponent the impression that you are out of control on a march, then using a half advance-retreat to make counter-time. Most of my setup footwork is to deceive my opponent whether i'm preparing to move forwards or backwards by using bounces, half advances, and advances and retreats.

[whtouche]

Another good way to steal time on an otherwise simul action is take a slow advance, then a quick half advance and a fast lunge. Your opponant will see the half advance and not be expecting the lunge so soon. The increase in speed in the sequence is important.

[ElementalRyuu]

What is an appell?
Oh and would it be wise for a person to bounce to the sides using a regular rythm then a sudden change in rythm when approaching one's opponent? (Example: Hop to the right side then the left side then the right side again in equal distances then hop to the left in a shorter distance in preparation for a flying stop-thrust on an opponent?)

[Epee_Pox]

Originally Posted by FoilyGeezer

The footwork drill I've been using is a combination of standard moves adding in a false advance or retreat. That is, movement of the front foot either closer to or futher from the back foot (as if one were retreating or advancing) without moving the back foot, and vice versa (moving the back foot with the front foot stationary). The idea is to present the illusion that your position on the strip is changing when in fact you're just moving your feet a bit further apart or closer together.

Has anyone ever tried to teach or been taught this formally? Empirically, it seems to be a valid tactic, as I can generally achieve either 1) some degree of succesful manipulation of my opponent's position relative to mine; or 2) a shift in my center of gravity over my legs differently which allows me to set up something unexpected.

I haven't been taught that formally in fencing, but it was standard training for me in martial arts -- i.e., take a step without actually changing distance, to fake out the other guy into making a distance error, then WHAP.

Since distance fakeouts are such a large part of fencing, I'm surprised not to have been formally taught to do it. All the moves I've been shown involve actual changes in distance, however slight or deceptive, rather than the mere appearance of a change in distance.

But whether it's formally taught or not, if it works, do it.

[daeceg]

My coach has been working extensively on little things like you're talking about. Currently, retreating into a fleche is his particular method of torture...you can sometimes steal time on an advancing opponent...

(first time I tried that, though, my feet slipped out from under me and I landed hard enough to dent my mask...ouch...)

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by ElementalRyuu

What is an appell?
Oh and would it be wise for a person to bounce to the sides using a regular rythm then a sudden change in rythm when approaching one's opponent? (Example: Hop to the right side then the left side then the right side again in equal distances then hop to the left in a shorter distance in preparation for a flying stop-thrust on an opponent?)

An appel is a sharp little stomp with the forward foot.

I don't know about the bouncing thing, but using the strip laterally as well as longitudinally is the mark of an experienced fencer.

Max Williams ( sabre ) has an interesting little move involving a sort of diagonal jump from the guard line to the very left edge of the strip, followed by a flunge. It seems to be very effective for him. My theory is that (a) opponents aren't generally prepared for this sort of unusual tangent (b) it precludes a right-handed opponent from flunging, as he'd have to shoot off the edge of the strip pretty quickly to do it, and (c) it tends to reduce the parrying options he has to think of...

[shlepzig]

I had a coach that had taught something like that, but somewhat in reverse of what you are talking about.

He would train us to make little motions of the back foot, to gain some ground previous to a lunge. Since the distance of your lunge depends on the location of the back foot and not the front, skootching your back foot in a touch after an advance or a bounce you could get a couple extra inches your opponent didn't know you had.

I never mastered it but he would also skootch it back during an attack so he could lean back just enough you couldn't hit him with a lunge than take you with a parry reposte.

He liked to deceive you with the back foot (which is usually hidden) and lead you on with the front foot. Or as Grasshopper may have said in his earlier posts "lie with the front foot, and act with the back foot".

Shlep.

[Grasshopper]

Originally Posted by shlepzig

I had a coach that had taught something like that, but somewhat in reverse of what you are talking about.

He would train us to make little motions of the back foot, to gain some ground previous to a lunge. Since the distance of your lunge depends on the location of the back foot and not the front, skootching your back foot in a touch after an advance or a bounce you could get a couple extra inches your opponent didn't know you had.

I never mastered it but he would also skootch it back during an attack so he could lean back just enough you couldn't hit him with a lunge than take you with a parry reposte.

He liked to deceive you with the back foot (which is usually hidden) and lead you on with the front foot. Or as Grasshopper may have said in his earlier posts "lie with the front foot, and act with the back foot".

Shlep.

Grasshopper says: "At big distance, young fencer beats old old fencer - at close distance, old fencer beats young fencer." Old fencer should gently push forward and fence with tips crossed at about 20cm.

[sabreur]

Originally Posted by Grasshopper

Grasshopper says: "At big distance, young fencer beats old old fencer - at close distance, old fencer beats young fencer." Old fencer should gently push forward and fence with tips crossed at about 20cm.

Grasshopper obviously doesn't fence sabre.

MR