This was a fun tournament for me. I fenced my best, mostly. Physically I put in all I could with lots of bouncing and fast footwork. Mentally, I felt pretty good about my focus and tactics. It was an A2 event with lots of good fencers. I did much better in the pools than I expected but lost my first DE.
I was going to warm up with Garrett Armstrong, but hooking up I found my LP epee grounding out. I thought I had fixed it the day before! Not having another epee right there and wanting to see if I could quickly fix the LP we unhooked. So I didn't get any fencing warm up, although I did a good amount of stretching, jumping, and so on. Turned out I had fixed the tip of my LP epee and tested it the day before. Then I had remembered the bell guard was on wrong, so I had taken it apart, rotated the guard, and put it back together. I had a little trouble getting the wires through the guard's rather small slot. Apparently I had failed to test the epee after that. Well, later I took it apart again and found one wire had broken right where it went through the guard. I had to rewire.
So I had to use a different epee. Remembering how I wasn't entirely happy with using my Vniti on Friday I used one of my cheaper Absolute epees instead. It worked just fine all through the tournament and felt good. It's stiffness is more like the LP blade, and I felt better about my beats and binds than I had with the Vniti on Friday.
My first pool bout was against Michael Orzechowski, who had come down from Alaska. I had fenced him before at the Battle in Seattle, vets, pools. I'd come close to beating him then, but lost. He had beaten Walter Dragonetti though, which was quite impressive. So I knew something about his style. He's very smart, but slower than me, if I am working hard. So I worked hard, bouncing in and out of distance a lot, probing. I found I could draw parries, sometimes rather big sweeping parries. I scored first, by drawing one of these parries and disengaging out with an inverse-advance lunge. Then he scored to tie 1-1. After a bit more maneuvering I tried something similar and scored. He was smarter about it and counterattacked. It would have been a double touch but his point just missed, sliding along my chest. The next time he did get a double, making it 3-2. Then he got a single, making it 3-3. I've forgotten what he did to get the single. I think I was setting something up and he attacked into my preparation, catching me off guard. The next point, I was bouncing and check-stepping in and out and he went low, for my foot or knee, leaning forward as he did. I instinctively put my point right on his shoulder long before his point got close. So I was up, 4-3. Remembering how I had let Carlo come back from behind on Friday I worked extra hard for that last point. I got it with a leg touch, winning 5-3.
Nice way to start. My confidence was boosted. I was tired from how hard I had worked but determined to continue to work as hard as I could. Pool bouts are short, I can put everything I have into them. I probably would not fence more than two DEs at best, so there was no need to save energy. And no excuse for slacking off.
Michael Orzechowski seems like a wonderful guy. He's very friendly. He told me I was fencing very well a few times over the day. Later I learned he had a bit of a knee injury and was not fencing his best. He talked to Russ about knee replacements near the end of the tournament. Apparently Michael is a sports doctor and does things like knee replacements. He made a point of warning Russ to be careful with his artificial knee—saying that "we" have gotten good at doing multiple hip replacements but still suck at multiple knee replacements. One knee replacement is usually pretty good, but it won't last forever and a second replacement will be much much worse.
Michael had brought a younger kid down from Alaska with him, and kept saying "if we had my brains and your body" they'd be so much better at fencing. I thought that came off a little wrong, suggesting the kid wasn't smart, but I understood what he meant. Michael is a much more experienced fencer and is really smart about it, but he's older and his body just can't do what he wants it do. When asking Russ about the Seattle International Veteran's Cup event next weekend—I guess he's down here for the week—he was disappointed there wouldn't be age groups, but was pleased that there are awards for the best fencer within each age group. His reaction was something like, "so much for earning a rating" (he's a C now), but he could win best of age—I think he said he's in his 50s, but perhaps he's over 60. Either way he'll still have some tough fencers to beat. No Dragonetti this time, but William Walker is in his 60s I think, and Russ might be. Then there's Johannes.
My next pool bout was against Jeff Goon, Audun's father. I think Jeff took up fencing after Audun started so hasn't been doing it very long. He was my pool's U fencer. I'm not sure if I had fenced him before. I won rather easily, mostly by baiting attacks then parry-riposting. Or just by getting the distance right and attacking straight in. I got up 3-0 before he scored. I had baited another attack but when I went to parry his blade wasn't there—he had disengaged or come in another line. I managed to counterattack as he hit, but I missed. That was a nice one for him. Next we both made a long lunge at the same time, bell guards clashing. His blade was a little outside mine. I didn't parry but the angle of our blades meant his got deflected slightly to the outside and he ended up missing, but I hit. For the final point I kept up my bouncing footwork, waiting for Jeff to have his weight on his back foot. Then I made a long lunge into distance, catching him flat footed and scoring. So I won, 5-1. I realize writing this up I still have never really talked to Jeff Goon. I should. I've talked to Audun's mother, Tanya Holland (Audun is Audun Holland-Goon), and to Audun. Hmm.
This was a very nice start to the tournament. But next I had to fence Zach Shaw. I'm not sure if I've fenced Zach before, but I've watched him beat people who can beat me. He's "only" a D, but a good D. He'll probably be a C before long. He's young, a teenager, and nice. I didn't have much of a plan. Both his footwork and bladework seemed good. I couldn't see any particular weakness. So I tried to just "fence my game". He nailed me with fleches again and again, winning 5-0. I'd try to parry his fleches, but he used little feints at the start of his fleches that tricked me into the wrong parry, again and again. Some of his fleches hit me on the arm. I started to open the distance and just try to get away. I think that worked a little, but still he caught me whenever distance closed a little. At 4-0 I was still trying my best, knowing every point counts in the pools. At one point it seemed like he was holding his arm a little low and I might be able to hit it from above (I'm a little taller than him too). I tried to set it up with a quick feint in another line, then made a lunge to the top of his arm. But he rather easily picked *my* arm from below before I could reach his. I think he had been holding his arm a little low as a trap, hoping for exactly the kind of thing I did. So he won 5-0.
Zach came in 2nd in our pool. I'm still not sure what I could have done differently, other than be more prepared for fleches. Maybe prime or septime parries. More care about getting hit in the arm. Audun beat him 5-3, maybe I can ask Audun sometime about him. They are both RCFC fencers, so perhaps they know each other's styles and weaknesses better. In the DEs Zach was the 10th seed. He beat Johannes, also a RCFC guy, then lost to Denys Kovtunenko, a Canadian I don't know.
My next bout was against Matthew Comes, who...yea. I've fenced him lots of times now and have never won. And he just gets better and better. When I began fencing again two years ago Matthew was a D. Now he's a B and probably soon will be an A. He's only 15 years old or so. I can't imagine where he'll be in a few more years, if he keeps it up. His dad takes him to all the NACs and such. I can picture them going to World Cups someday. Anyway, I know Matthew's style better than Zach's. I knew he is very good at fleches and toe touches, and an excellent infighter. My plan, if it can be called a plan, was to stay far away. I knew I had to keep the distance extra wide or he'd get me with his long attacks. I also knew there was little hope in fleching him and it was suicide to end up infighting with him. So I kept far away. It wasn't much of a plan because I didn't know how I would score, other than wait and hope.
I don't remember the exact points of my bout with Matthew. He won 5-3, which isn't as bad as I usually do against him. He's beaten me 5-0 or 5-1 before, more than once. He didn't get any toe touches on me, nor any infighting touches. He did catch me flat-footed, with fleches, a couple times. But keeping the distance extra long seemed to work better than anything else I've ever tried with him. Also, I was able to see his baiting tactics and not fall for them like I might in the past. I watched him in other bouts over the day and saw how he often relaxes and retreats calmly, or even steps back as if he's "stopped fencing". Once, in a DE bout, it even looked like he "stopped" and made a kind of salute-like motion. I think these are all attempts to bait attacks. Or at least they are tempo changes. He seems to change his tempo quite a lot in other ways too. I've been trying similar things in practice after this tournament. I'm finding it feels good to relax and take some slow steps back, especially if I've been tensely focused. It can help me "reset", and sometimes it seems like it might throw my opponent off. Even with someone like Varney, who won't fall for the "bait", it feels like it can interrupt whatever he might have been planning.
Anyway, all that to say I didn't fall for Matthew's tempo changes. Whenever he relaxed I prepared for a possible "surprise attack" from him. By keeping the distance wide I ended up near my end of the strip a few times. I used to hate that, but I'm getting better about it. And I think I scored some of my points when I was in my strip end box. Maybe Matthew got a little more eager to attack when I was in the box, which is a key point about being in the box, right?
After Matthew I was 2 and 2. I wasn't happy about my 5-0 loss to Zach, but okay with my 5-3 loss to Matthew. With my 5-3 and 5-1 wins I still felt I was doing pretty good. But I knew I had to fence Adam Frank next, the A fencer of our pool.
I had seen Adam Frank fence a number of times, and fenced him in at least one pool bout. I watched him win first place in the 2013 Leon Auriol Open. I was in his pool then, and, huh, checking now I see he beat me 5-4, which is much closer than I expected. Still, he won all the pools bouts. Tobias and Russ both got 4 points against him too. In the DEs of that tournament he beat Zach Shaw, Stephen Wilson, William Wang, and Sam Kaardal. In short, having seen him win the Leon Auriol Open I feared him. He's a young leftie. My notes about him said only "NWFC, A2013, leftie, good flicks, extremely good". Lot of help that was! Jeff Lucas was in the pool next to mine and at some point I told him how I had to fence Adam Frank and was worried about it, and even showed him my non-helpful notes. For some reason I can't remember now, Jeff "requested" that I beat Adam. It was something silly, like because Jeff had lost to Jay, the A fencer of his pool, he said I had to beat Adam. I jokingly said "well, okay fine, I'll beat him for you".
As it turned out, I did beat Adam, to my surprise. I clearly remember after we shook hands at the end I turned and started back toward my end of the strip and saw a group of people who had been watching—mainly the people in my pool. I was amazed I had won and probably had a silly expression on my face. When I saw them watching I opened my eyes wide and mouthed "wow". They were all smiling and I found myself surrounded by congratulations. It felt awesome. People congratulated me on it several times later too. John Comes thanked me for beating him—I guess he doesn't like Adam very much for some reason. I've never really talked to Adam and don't know anything about him personally. He seemed rather crushed when he shook hands though. He still took first place in our pool though. In the DEs he beat Luke LaRocque, then lost to Farooq Habib 5-0. Yes, 5-0 in a DE bout to 15. I got that one on video. Passivity was called three times. They went into overtime with the score still 0-0.
Anyway, my pool bout with Adam Frank. A bit before, when Adam was fencing someone else, Russ came by and I asked if he had any advice. He said he didn't know Adam, but after watching for a minute said something about his parry 8 and how I should parry 8 with him, but I'd have to "do it twice" to get through. So, that wasn't much of a plan but it was something. I spent most of the bout trying to nag at Adam's hand, finding I could draw his parry 8 to some degree. Russ's advice is usually good and I was in fact able to score a few times by circling 8 with his 8, followed by a second parry 8, catching his blade and moving into a higher line. Adam is a leftie so our parry 8s circled together. I think I was up 3-2 when he made an excellent and very hard hit to my leg. Days later as I type this I still have quite a welt about two inches above my knee from that hit. That tied it 3-3. Then, somehow, we got a double, 4-4. The final point was a surprise. We took our time maneuvering. He kept retreating toward his end of the strip. Eventually one of us attacked and the other counterattacked, or something simultaneous happened, I can't remember exactly how it started. Our guards clashed. I heard a beep and the ref say halt. Since we were at his end of the strip the score machine was way behind me and I couldn't see it. But at RCFC they have red and green lights at each strip end and I saw the green light go off. No red light. In that instant I did not remember which color I was and thought he was green, thus he had scored and won. I turned and headed back for my on guard line to salute and only then saw the score machine showing I had won, 5-4. I was green!
That win was the high point of the day for me. Having everyone congratulate me felt very good. And I was able to go to Jeff Lucas and say "well you said I had to", all nonchalantly.
My final pool bout was against Audun Holland-Goon. Audun is very young and still rather small. I think he started fencing around the time I began again, two years ago. We've fenced a few times. At first I think I could beat him fairly easily, but recently it's become more difficult and he's beaten me. In a U tournament in Tacoma last year I had him in a DE and made the mistake of assuming I would win. I lost. Now, facing him in this pool, I knew his style better. He's patient and careful, and tends to wait for chances to parry and riposte, which he's pretty good at. Sometimes he tries for toe touches. It's hard to attack or feint to his low lines because I'm quite a bit taller. Watching him in our pool I noticed his footwork tended to fall into certain repeating patterns. So my plan was to continue the bouncing fast footwork I had been doing, feinting in and out a lot but mostly being patient and waiting for openings or second intentions. I think I was able to see patterns in his footwork and take advantage of them. On the other hand he got me with picks to the arm a couple times.
Audun, being cautious, kept retreating, and we fenced mostly near his end of the strip. I was also cautious but felt it was to my advantage to be at his end of the strip. There I could wait for him to get nervous and try an attack or perhaps more easily fall for a feint. I kept waiting for him to make a mistake, but he didn't give me many. Once, to break things up, I fleched. I thought he parried and nothing happened, but apparently I had just hit. Another time I was making overly large blade movements and he pegged my hand. He managed to get to four points first, 3-4, which made me worry. Somehow I got a single, making it 4-4. In the final point we ended up infighting. I made a low feint then a high attack, closing distance a lot. He parried and our blades got bound up high, our bodies close. I managed to pull out and riposte, or remise, in prime to his hip. It worked and I won, 5-4.
I felt happy about that win too, especially for having been down a couple points. Audun seemed fine with it and smiled when we shook hands, saying "good bout".
So I came out of the pool with four wins and two losses, which was way better than I had expected. I knew no one in our pool was undefeated, so I figured I must have come in better than average. I was wrong!
I learned something about seeding after pools. If there's a tie in terms of percentage of wins and indicator, it is broken by the number of touches scored. I was in a three way tie like this. Matthew Comes, Steven Benack, and I all won 4 out of 6 bouts and had an indicator of +1. I had scored 23 touches and received 22. Matthew Comes scored 24 touches and received 23. Steven Benack scored 25 touches and received 24. Therefore of us three Steven got the highest seed (14) and I got the lowest (16). I'm not sure I see the logic. All three of us lost one bout 3-5. I had the worst loss, 0-5, while Matthew lost one 1-5, and Steven 2-5. So I did worst in that regard, and Steven did best. However I won one of my bouts 5-1, while the best Matthew or Steven did was 5-3. So I did best in that regard. Both Steven and I had two close wins, 5-4, while Matthew only had one 5-4 win. The rest of his wins were 5-3. So Matthew did best in that regard. Anyway, as 16th seed I fenced Matson Lalor, 17th seed. Had I been 15th seed I would have fenced John Comes, who I probably would have had an easier time with. Instead John Comes had to fence his son Matthew.
 |
| Seeding after the pools, tie resolved by touches scored. |
After the pool was over I was quite pleased with my 4 and 2 results. I knew no one in the pool was undefeated but was surprised when Zach Shaw said we had a "five way tie" for first place. Out of the seven fencers in my pool five had won 4 and lost 2. Zach had lost to Audun and Matthew Comes. Audun had lost to Adam Frank and me. Adam had lost to Zach and me. Matthew had lost to Audun and Adam. And I had lost to Zach and Matthew. So it went to indicators. Adam's was +13, Zach's +8, and Audun's +3. So they came in first to third. Matthew and I had indicators of +1, but he had scored one touch more than I had (and received one more), so he got 4th place and I got 5th. Weird how these things work out sometimes. Makes it even clearer how every point counts in the pools.
My DE was against Matson Lalor, a leftie Canadian kid I had heard of but never fenced or even watched. Hans had been in his pool and I asked him for advice, but all he could say was that Matson had good bladework and footwork. That wasn't very helpful, although his warning about Matson's excellent parries at least kept me cautious. In our bout Matson took an early lead. He was able to hit my arm quite a lot. I tried the various leftie tactics I know and they all failed. Eventually I had some success using septime parries/takes, which isn't something I usually consider a leftie tactic, except perhaps in the form of a 7-6 bind. I also got a point with a prime-like riposte, which I thought of as "Bela approved". As an aside: I learned this tournament that Bela Suveg is quite friendly and nice off the strip. I had only seen him fencing before and thought he seemed rather arrogant, maybe even a jerk. Jeff Lucas, who had apparently chatted with him before, told me Bela was a great guy. He was in Jeff's pool next to mine, and Jeff introduced us—Bela said we already knew each other, although we had never talked before as far as I remember. He was very nice "off strip". He even complimented me on my fencing after a couple bouts, especially on my prime-like ripostes. That's why I felt like my prime riposte against Lalor would be "Bela approved".
In any case, my few points against Lalor were too little too late, and he won 15-5. Afterward Russ talked to me about it. He said I wasn't closing my outside line as well as I should have, especially with a leftie like Lalor. He also said I was going in with a bent arm too much, and Lalor was attacking straight in. I said I had been trying to draw attacks a lot, feinting, thus the bent arm. Russ said if I was going to do that then I needed to "get out faster". Yep.
I felt bad after losing to Lalor by so much. But before long I got over it and enjoyed the rest of the tournament. I took a bunch of videos but haven't gotten them all online yet. I'll add them here as I do.
I'd also like to say more about the rest of the tournament, especially watching some bouts, like Matthew Comes, Farooq Habib, and especially Sam Larsen, who came in first. Perhaps I'll add more later when I have more time.
The overtime period of Matthew Comes and Dnys Kovtenenko's bout. Matthew came back from behind to tie it up at 8-8 as time ran out. Matthew got priority yet got the winning point with a behind-the-back move with seconds left. Afterward Johannes kept saying "that was so dangerous!"-->
The final bout. Sam Larsen was in excellent form:
Bela Suveg and Yuly Suvorov, from a non-ideal angle:
No comments:
Post a Comment