Here's the Ask Fred result links:
RCFC Thursday Night D & Under Epee #1
12/20/2012, Rain City Fencing Center: Bellevue, WA
http://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=19698
MTFC "E" and Under Mixed Epee
01/05/2013; Metro Tacoma Fencing Club: Tacoma, WA
http://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=20061
At the D and under I felt a little shy and alone. Donald Lake, from Tacoma, was there, and we chatted a little, but I failed to ask if he wanted to warm up, being shy, and as a result didn't do any warm up fencing at all. Ursula Lawson, from SAS, was there too, but we didn't manage to chat much until it was over for me.
In addition to not doing any warm up fencing I had trouble getting in the right mindset. Instead of energy and focus I couldn't shake a kind of awkward low-level anxiety and self-consciousness. There were a bunch of "kids"—teens and twenty-somethings—from the Rain City club—who I thought I was prepared for but had an energy that tended to overwhelm my distracted unfocusedness. My first pool bout was against one of them, Matthew Comes and I quickly lost 2-5. Turns out Matthew is much better than his father, John Comes, who I had fenced before. I lost to a couple other "kids", Benjamin Nield (1-5) and Heino Hulsey-Vincent (3-5), fenced two bouts to 4-4, losing one to Jim Henderson and winning one against Mark Blom, and winning one 5-1 against Arthur Wall. So in my pool I came in 6th out of 7, with an indicator of -5. My seed was 15 out of 21. Not horrible, but not nearly as good as I was expecting.
With 21 fencers we had 11 byes—over half the fencers. My first DE was against the one guy I had done well against in the pools, Arthur Wall—another Rain City "kid". He had seeded 18. He was more challenging in the DE. We racked up a lot of double touches, the score being very close all the way to 14-14. After some back and forth I attacked with a fleche and hit, but his counterattack hit too, I thought, and I looked up at the lights expecting a double touch but only my light was on. I won, 15-14! Woosh, that was close. Afterwards I heard one of his friends say "that looked pretty epic".
Due to my fairly low seed of 15 my second DE was against the 2nd seed fencer, Zach Shaw—yet another Rain City "kid". At first I did alright, and even pulled ahead by a couple points, I think. But he soon figured me out and I failed to figure him out. I lost 8-15.
I stuck around and watched the rest of the tournament. Donald Lake, who had seeded 16, won his first DE, against Stephanie English, and lost his second, against the 1st seed Scott Phillips. Don's placement on the DE tree was the same as mine except near the "top" of the tree and the 1st seed, rather than near the "bottom" and the 2nd seed. Ursula did better than either of us. She had seeded 13, not quite high enough for a bye. She won her first DE was against Henry Seurer, 15-13, and her second against Dan Berke, 15-13. I watched her third DE, against Benjamin Nield, who had been in my pool and seeded 5th. It was a close bout. She fell behind by a few points but caught up with some nice hits to the wrist and took the lead with a lovely fleche. I tried to offer advise during the breaks but had little to say except that her hits to the wrist were good. She managed a few more hits but Benjamin did better and won 15-11. Ursula came in 8th overall (whereas I came in 15th and Don 16th).
After that I watched the final bouts. The 2nd seed, Zach Shaw, who had beat me, was out, having lost to Carlo Malaguzzi. Carlo lost to the 3rd seed, Russell Key. The 4th seed, Dan Berke, was also out, having lost to Ursula. So 1st seed Scott Phillips (who had beaten Don Lake) fenced 5th seed Benjamin Nield (who had beaten Ursula). That bout was exciting and fun to watch. Scott seemed to be the stronger fencer, but Benjamin held on, keeping the score tied or nearly so. At a score of around 11 or 12 the ref called "non-combativity", after both fencers spent a minute trying to get the other to attack, with no blade contact at all. Suddenly the game changed. The clock was set to one minute and a coin flip gave priority to Scott Phillips. If I recall right, Benjamin was down a point, 10-11, I think, so he had to score twice to win, while Scott merely had to run out the minute with a tie or better. Benjamin tried all he could to get Scott to attack but eventually he had to attack. With the clock down to less than 20 seconds he managed to tie it up and even pull ahead, if I remember right. But Scott tied it up again with only about 8 seconds left. Then there was a series of rapid attacks as the seconds ran out. In one case, at 4 seconds I think, the action started and stopped without the clock losing a second at all. Finally Benjamin had no choice but to attack as fast as he could. The scored got to 14-13 with 2 or 3 seconds left and Benjamin down a point. Due to the "sudden death" priority, Scott would win if it was a tie, so Benjamin had to attack. Scott went for the fairly simple double touch, winning 15-14.
It was an exciting bout to watch, and sometimes funny, as Benjamin did a lot of "unorthodox" things, apparently trying to draw attacks or at least confuse. He would couch way down, or kind of wave his arms around, or did odd steps and prances. Someone watching said he was from the "Varney school", meaning John Varney's son, who I've enjoyed fencing at SAS. One of Benjamin's "tricks" I found interesting, and had noted during the pools without realizing it was a trick, was to step back and seemingly relax, seeming to let his guard down, as if he thought the action stopped or the time was up or otherwise "no longer fencing". He did this to me a couple times in the pools and I had thought about attacking, but for one reason or another hadn't. Watching him in this DE bout it was obviously a trick with the aim of getting the other person to attack. I thought that was an interesting "meta" tactic and said to Jane Vincent, who was also watching, that I might try it myself sometime. She pointed out that Scott hadn't fallen for it. Still, it makes me wonder what other kind of "meta" tactics one might devise.
The final bout, between Scott Phillips and Russell Key, was more normal. As I didn't know either fencer I wasn't particularly interested and half watched as I packed up to go. Scott won, 15-12.
It was a D1 event, meaning the winner would earn a D rating and 4 others an E. Scott already had a D and everyone in the top 10 except Russell Key had an E or a D. So only one rating was awarded—an E2012 for Russell. Benjamin and Zach were D fencers already, so got no rating change. Carlo Malaguzzi was an E2012, and since this was the last couple of weeks of 2012 he got no change either.
The second tournament was Metro Tacoma Fencing Club's E and under event. I felt a little more comfortable at this one, knowing a few more people a little better. Jeramy Gee was there, as was Ursula and Amber Race, from SAS. Donald Lake as well, and John Comes, Matthew Comes, Carlo Malaguzzi, Andrew Lee, and my nemesis from the last U tournament, Craig Haworth. And I always enjoy the Tacoma club and its friendly people like Aaron Page and Tobias Lee.
Despite feeling more comfortable, actually warming up with Jeramy, and having to face only E and U fencers, I did even worse in the pools than in the previous tournament, losing all but one bout, and barely winning that one, 5-4. I started out losing 1-5 to Robert Tiosejo, then to Audun Holland-Goon, 5-3. I thought I would do better against Natalie Southard, but barely won, 5-4. Craig Haworth was in my pool and I was ready for his circle six moves, but still lost, 5-4. Finally I fenced Tre-mar Baptiste, who I have beaten handily in the past and thought I would again, but he was on and trounced me, 5-1. I came in 5th out of 6 in my pool, with an indicator of -10. My seed was 20 out of 23. Not good! The top seeds were Andrew Lee (1), James Gillaspy (2), Matthew Comes (3), and Craig Haworth (4). Jeramy seeded 7, Ursula 11, and Donald Lake 13.
My first DE was against Donald Lake! This was the second or maybe third time we've fenced a DE bout (the first time he said before we began, in a friendly way, "would you like to surrender now?" And after I won, "I told you you should have surrendered!"). This time we were fairly even, but I managed to maintain a bit of a lead and won 15-13. This put me up against Craig Haworth in my second DE. Ah, Craig! Two tournaments before, at the SAS U event, Craig beat me in the final bout, earning his E. I had left that event thinking about his habit of doing circle six type parries. Later, fencing Jennifer at SAS I got a chance to try some tactics against it because she had a similar circle six style. By the time of this tournament I knew that I could evade the circle six by circling counter-clockwise (I still had to remind myself in my head, "counter-clockwise"!). Some of the tactics I had worked out with Jennifer worked with Craig too, it turned out. Like making quick advance-lunges or fleches with a counter-clockwise "screw" motion. Also attacking with that same counter-clockwise motion, drawing the circle six parry, then, with distance closed a bit, reversing direction and catching the blade with my own six parry and either attacking straight in or doing a simple disengage attack. Having fenced Craig in the pools to 4-4, I knew these kind of things could work. So I went into the DE bout with some ideas ready to go.
In the pools I had scored a point with an immediate fleche and that counter-clockwise evasive motion. In the DE I scored that way three times—twice "immediately" after the ref called "fence!" and once after some preparatory bladework. And I scored in a number of other ways. But Craig scored too, often with counterattacks. I think we scored more double touches than single. The score went up rapidly, often tied and never more than two points apart. I was down a point as we got near the end of the first period. I knew it was foolish to press attacks just because the period was running out, but I didn't want to go into the second period down a point or two. I tried to at least tie it up, but Craig managed double touches. It was over before the first period had even ended, 15-13. Damn!
I stayed to watch the rest. I didn't get to see Ursula fence. She also won her first DE, against Natalie Southard, 15-7, and lost her second, to Audun Holland-Goon, 13-15. Jeramy, seeding 7, got a bye. His first DE was against John Comes, which he handily won 15-9. His second was against James Gillaspy, the somewhat mysterious 2nd seed. Mysterious because most people didn't know him, he had come up from Oregon. His style was, as Jeramy put it, kind of like Don Penner with more footwork. That is, he tended to defend and counterattack. However, he could not make this work against Jeramy's height (something like 6 foot, two or three inches), long arm and pommeled french grip. Jeramy won 15-8. That put him in the final four, up against Matthew Comes (who seeded 3rd).
Matthew is young and fast, and had good point control. He is excellent at hitting the foot, and managed it against Jeramy several times. I noted the way he tended to do it: He would advance and initiate some bladework higher up, just enough to draw parries but not counterattacks, then suddenly drop the blade to the foot. He usually timed it so the other fencer's blade was raised in a way that make counterattacks harder. The danger of toe attacks is you expose yourself to being hit higher up, especially if the other person manages to withdraw their foot and fleche. Jeramy was ready to do just that, but didn't manage to actually do it once. The best he did was to not get hit on the foot and counterattack too late to hit.
Jeramy is quite a bit taller than Matthew and had the obvious advantage in terms of distance. Matthew is good at infighting and skilled with some of those weird over-the-head and behind-the-back moves. Everyone watching and both fencers clearly knew that Matthew's main hope was to get into infighting situations, negating Jeramy's distance advantage. Jeramy did a good job of keeping his distance though, and Matthew only managed to score with infighting a few times. Often Jeramy would manage to get a long distance counterattack in and score first or at least make it a double touch. It was a very close bout. Jeramy was up or at least tied quite a bit, and Matthew was getting frustrated. But he managed several toe touches near the end and the score ended up 14-13, Matthew. At that point he could afford a simple double touch and took it, winning 15-14. So close! Jeramy got 3rd place as a result.
Matthew Comes went on to fence Craig Haworth in the final bout. Craig, who had barely beaten me, and gone on to beat Carlo Malaguzzi (4th seed), 15-10, then Andrew Lee (1st seed), 15-7. Watching him I saw how he tended a bit to the defensive, rather calmly waiting for attacks then using his strong circle six parry and riposte. He defeated Andrew with what seemed like ease. I found that bout amusing because both Craig and Andrew had earned their E ratings by beating me in the final bout of two different U tournaments.
So the final bout, for a D rating, was between Craig and Matthew Comes. All the U fencers had fallen out before the final 4, with Audun Holland-Goon having done best, coming in 7th place, and Tre-mar Baptiste doing good too, coming in 9th. So whoever came in first would earn a D rating, and the next three fencers would update their Es to 2013 (all three turned out to be E2012s). Anyway, in this final bout I thought Matthew Comes was more likely to win, perhaps because I had done fairly well against Craig myself. It was fairly close, but Craig's strong parry-ripostes, and his ability to avoid most of Matthew's toe touch attempts, won in the end, 15-13. So Craig, my friendly nemesis, earned his D. Now I am all the more eager to face him again and beat him!
Okay, so that's my report. I tried taking some pictures at the second event, but they mostly came out blurry, as you can see. One of these days I think I will bring the nice Nikon camera to a fencing event and see if I can get better shots, perhaps using a very high ISO setting. I discovered in the issue of "American Fencing" that just came in the mail that Serge Timacheff is a professional fencing and sports photographer. Apparently he runs http://fencingphotos.com, and is an "official FIE Photographer"! If I get the chance I'll have to chat with him about this.
Finally, the "lull" mentioned in the title of this post: Due to the end of December holidays and Tara going to Minnesota for work twice in January, I am not fencing nearly as much as I have gotten used to. After the D and under tournament there was no fencing for over two weeks, followed by a single evening of open epee and then the E and under tournament. I haven't fenced since then and will be getting another "week off" later this month. Sigh...
Blurry pictures posted to Flickr, starting here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pfly/8372664654
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| Pools, Metro Tacoma Fencing Club |
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