Vet Combined Men's Epee
http://salle.byethost6.com/FTEvent4.htm
https://askfred.net/Results/roundResults.php?seq=1&event_id=111684&highlight_competitor_id=91067
I was hoping to do better, but felt like I learned a lot, and enjoyed myself.
Rating Stuff
The day before I worked out what it would take for me to earn a D rating, since it seemed possible in this event: Looking to be an A2 with just 25 fencers, and almost everyone at least possibly "beatable", if I was smart and fencing well. If it was A2 I would need to come in 9th or 10th to get a D, which meant, I worked out, winning two DEs (rounds of 32 and 16) or doing very well in the pools and winning one DE (ie, get a bye and win a round of 16 DE or be the best 1-2 of those losing the round of 16). If I didn't do great in the pools (like top 5 or 6) and won my first DE I would likely face someone very tough in a second DE. That said I wasn't overly focused on earning a D, just that I had worked it out and saw I would have to do very well in the pools to have much hope of it.
As it turned out some of the A fencers lost early in the DEs to the point where the event dropped from an A2 to a B2. An A2 event needs to have 2 As and 2 Bs (or As) in the final top 8. In this case the final top 8 ended up with three As and no Bs. William Walker, a B, got 9th place, one short of what was needed to be an A2 event. John Varney, the fourth A, lost in the round of 16 and came in 11th. As a B2 event, well, I would have had to come in 5th-8th to get a D, and that sure didn't happen.
Looking at the ratings to be earned in A2 vs. B2 it is interesting to see that the higher ratings are most strongly effected. Coming in 12th is enough to earn an E in either format. In A2 5th-8th gets you a C, but just a D in B2. Likewise 2nd-4th gets a B in A2 and a C in B2. And of course 1st place goes from A to B.
As a result of all this Erich Cranor, who won, did not renew his A2014. Tobias Lee would have earned a B but instead renewed his C to 2015. Doug Robinson and Harry Starr, both rated E, came in 6th and 8th and would have earned Cs but instead got a Ds. Mark Blom would have renewed his C.
Pools
The rating stuff doesn't matter for me, since I didn't do awesome in the pools (though not terrible, three and three), and lost my first DE.
There were three pools of six and one of seven. I was in the pool of seven, which was nice. I won three and lost three, but had two 5-4 wins and bad loses (5-1, 5-2, 5-3). So my indicator was -4. I came in 5th out of seven. Out of the seven fencers three were left-handed.
In hindsight I realized I was not very well focused on fencing. And I didn't have a plan. Usually I try to have a handful of specific actions and tactics in mind, but this time I didn't. I think I fenced somewhat randomly and hesitantly as a result. Also the event began at 10:00, which when adding in morning time to eat, get ready, drive, warm up, etc, meant getting up and going around 7:30. Sometimes I'm fine with that kind of thing, but this time it felt like I never quite woke up fully and was somewhat spacey, fencing on autopilot too much.
I warmed up with Carlo Malaguzzi, which was enjoyable. By the time the pool began I felt physically ready, more or less, but not quite there mentally—although I was apparently too spacey to realize I wasn't quite there mentally.
I had the very first pool bout, against Andrew Smith, a leftie. He's an SAS clubmate but usually does foil. We hadn't fenced for a year or more. I wasn't sure what to do with him and he quickly scored the first two, maybe three points. Finally I started to wake up and think. I got a nice hit under his hand. He got another point or two, making the score 4-1. Not looking too good! But every point counts in pools. I started working harder, getting quicker on my feet, not doing suicidal things, and going for lots of shallow targets, especially the hand. I managed to score, and score, crawling back and getting to 4-4, then getting the final point too, winning 5-4. Probably my best tournament pool comeback ever. Woo! I felt like a problem was presented and I had solved it.
Then I had Jeff Lucas. He surprised me right away with a fast attack right off the line. We exchanged a couple points and got to 2-2. I tried to wake up and solve the problem. Using invitations and circle-sixes I managed to get Jeff to fleche and I countered with a prime parry-riposte. I guess it looked nice, Andrew clapped. I got the next two points to win 5-2.
Next was Mark Blom, another leftie. Lately it seems either he beats me by quite a bit or I beat him. This time he beat me 5-2. I was paying close attention to my outside line—too much attention maybe: He got me a few times with a high inside opposition. He got up 4-1. Unlike my bout with Andrew I did not manage a comeback. We doubled at the end, so I lost 5-2. A strange thing about this bout: Our strip was right next to another pool's strip. Both bouts had lefties but were facing the opposite ways. Jim Arrigoni and William Walker were next to Mark and me. All four of us were fencing close to our outside strip edges, which put us really close to each other. More than once there were epees and bodies getting in the way of the neighboring bout. Once I ended up landing a hit on Jim, in the other bout. Can I blame this as a distraction? Hmm, maybe?
Erich Cranor was next, arguably the best fencer in our pool (although he came in third place this time). The last time I fenced him, in Portland, I managed to lose 4-5. But no, he won 5-1. I tried some inside-hand flicks which almost worked, but didn't. I also tried some leg and foot hits, which also almost worked, but didn't. I think my balance was not great.
Then I had Joseph Cohen, who I didn't know. Apparently he is from New Jersey. I don't remember the details very well. We began pretty even, getting to 3-3. I got a point up with a nice-feeling beat-fleche. Then he got a point making it 4-4. Somehow I managed the last point and won 5-4.
Finally I had Doug Robinson. I'm pretty sure I had fenced him a couple times before and won. But not this time, he beat me badly, 5-2. He went on to do quite well, coming in 6th overall and earning his D. My scribbled notes say I wasn't fencing smart. I got one nice beat-disengage, but otherwise not good. I made too many ill-timed hand and even foot attempts, generally off-balance and opening myself up. I knew I needed patience and waiting, but instead was reckless. At 4-2 I recklessly fleched, badly, and lost 5-2.
So I was three and three out of the pools, 5th out of 7 in my pool. I was 15th seed out of 25. There were byes only to 7th seed, so I didn't get one.
I was paired with 18th seed Fred Frank. I had never fenced him before. I think he is the father of the Portland fencers Timmy Frank and Adam Frank. Toby had him in his pool and told me he was strong and aggressive, and gave me some ideas. But interestingly, Fred changed his style between the pools and the DEs. He used a French grip and almost totally defensive tactics, all counterattacks. He put his weight very much on his front foot, which I thought I should be able to take advantage of, somehow. He used absence of blade and just waited. I tried the obvious thing: Using feints and second intention, but couldn't make it work. He wouldn't bite my feints unless they were truly threatening. But in order to be truly threatening I had to commit myself to more of a real attack than a feint. I needed to find that small zone between a feint and a real attack, but it was too fine a line with him. I thought his having his weight so much on his front foot meant he could retreat quickly but would have trouble attacking. Yet he was able to fleche quite well, I quickly discovered. Against his absence of blade I tried stealing distance enough to fleche, but could not find the right distance. He was very fast and accurate.
The first period with me down 5-2. Being up a few points he simply continued his defensive tactic and I tried to catch up but instead fell farther behind, eventually losing 10-3. Well, I was okay with it. I like fencing people I haven't before. Being presented with new problems and trying to solve them. This is something I don't get to do much in practice and am only slowly getting better at. I carefully watched Fred Frank's following DEs, to see how others dealt with him. Fred took out William Walker with basically the same tactics he used with me. William did better than I did, losing 10-8. Then Mark Blom got to try. Their bout was very close and Fred wasn't able to be quite as completely defensive. I think they went 9-9, but Fred got the last point and won. Then Toby fenced Fred. With more patience and care than I had had Toby slowly managed to get up a couple points. As time was running out Fred was forced out of his defensive tactic. His attacks mostly failed or resulted in doubles. With a flurry of points at the very end Toby won 10-6.
Then Toby fenced Erich for 1st place. It was a close bout. Erich won 10-8.
Afterwards I thought about the tournament and came away thinking my main problem was not having a plan. Usually I try to have a set of actions in mind, at least for the pools. Whether I use them or not depends on who I'm fencing and how it is going, but it seems helpful to have them ready to pull out if needed. In this case I didn't have much of anything in mind. And I was reluctant to try risky things, so I ended up doing a lot of in-and-out footwork and bladework without a real plan. I got taken advantage of a lot, especially when I inevitably made a mistake in footwork or distance or whatever. I think I also tried too many times to hit under the hand. I've been getting better at that, and it worked well with Andrew Smith, but mostly it seemed to open my arm up for a high line attack.
Also interesting was fencing three lefties. In line with my focus on the hand I tried that 4-flick to the hand thing a lot, but it didn't work a single time. Hmm. Anyway, after this, and in preparation for the Rain City Open, I came up with a specific plan of actions, a "pool plan", and practiced it over the week before the next tournament. So in short, while I didn't do great at this tournament I felt I learned a lot.
