Battle in Seattle 2016, Senior Epee

Battle in Seattle 2016, Senior Epee

As expected, I got fairly stomped on. But on the bright side I had a good pool bout with Matson Lalor, despite losing, and a good DE bout, also despite losing. But mostly I got stomped. Kinda embarrassing, but oh well:

http://www.fencingtime.com/LiveResults/Battle2016/FTEvent110264323.htm

https://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=30762&highlight_competitor_id=91067&event_id=121248

While writing about the Battle in Seattle vet epee I looked back and discovered I had had a downward trend over the four years I've done it, until this year. The senior epee Battle in Seattle event is much harder and I usually don't do very well. But do I have a downward trend there too? Let's see...84th out of 112 (2014), 72nd out of 89 (2015), and 82nd out of 91 (2016). Yep. Damn. ...well, actually, last year was very similar to this year (basically getting stomped on, winning just one pool bout), while the year before was the time I won one pool bout, eeked out another, and came close in two more. And oh yea, that was also the year my DE was with John Varney, which I lost of course. I ended up in a slightly higher spot thanks to the better pool.

POOLS

I did poorly, so let's see if I can keep this write-up short.

My first pool bout was with Patric Wallace, who I had never seen before. He was friendly. We chatted a little during the pool. Apparently he is from New Jersey. I didn't check anyone's rating until just now. Patric is an A13. He killed me 5-1. He was strong and used lots of beats. My one point was when he fleched and I smacked his blade in 8 and riposted to the body as he passed.

Second bout was with Matson Lalor, a Canadian from Dynamo I had seen a few times before. I don't think we had fenced before, but maybe. I thought he was an A, but looking now I see he is a B15. Anyway, this was the one pool bout I felt pretty good about. Mostly because I got two toe touches. I rarely even try for them in tournaments. Now and then I've gotten one. I don't think I had ever gotten two in a single pool bout.

He kept pushing me back. I would retreat, but tried to keep up some in-and-out footwork. Early in the bout I noticed his foot seeming rather close. In the midst of other things I went for it and to my own surprise, hit. After that we got to 2-2 somehow. Then he fleched. I parried but could not riposte before he passed. He managed a remise as he passed and scored. The ref took a moment to consider whether he had passed before hitting, but he hadn't. It was a good hit. Then he was pushing me again and I pulled off another toe touch, making it 3-3. The first one had felt nice, but the second one felt even better. Something about getting those. I was hoping they might demoralize him a bit. Maybe they did. He seemed a little more cautious. But maybe they also made me overconfident or something. I made an impatient attack at a bad time and got hit. Then, down 4-3, while we were energetically fencing I tried to pull off another toe touch, but it wasn't close and I got hit.

So I lost 5-3. As I unhooked Patric said "two toe touches, yes, but three? yea, no." He went on to say my toe touches were very nice and well hidden. It was nice to hear. I felt good about the bout.

My next bout was with Dillon Grewell. I had seen him before, and maybe we had fenced before, but I couldn't remember details. I thought I'd have a decent chance. I thought he was probably a C, and looking now I see he is. Watching him, and chatting with Patric, I got the idea that he tended to telegraph his fleches. But when we fenced I fell into a weird mindset where I was either too passively spacey or too impulsively reckless. He killed me 5-0. Ouch.

Then I had Glenn Biasi. I think he had come mainly for vet foil, but was doing epee as well "just because". He did poorly overall. I didn't think about any of that going in. I was annoyed with my spacey mindset with Dillon and eager to refocus and re-energize. So I fenced hard and high-energy. I won 5-1. Afterward Patric, who had been watching, said I didn't have to work so hard to beat him. I said I was trying to get my mind, and body, back in the groove, which he seemed to find reasonable.

Next bout was with Henry Lange, the tall leftie who won the whole tournament. I had fenced him once or twice before and always had a hard time. And he's only gotten better. I had something of a plan, but it didn't work at all. Another 5-0 loss, ugh. Twice he got me with a long lunge into my feint check-steps. Twice with lovely fleches. And once while I was trying to worry his hand while keeping distance. Sigh.

My final bout was with Zach Shaw, a kid who I've fenced a few times and feel like I should be able to handle, but somehow never do.

DIRECT ELIMINATION

With a pool like that I thought I would get an impossible DE, but it turned out better than I feared. I still lost, but it was a good, fun, fairly close bout. It was with Michael Desimone, a guy I had never met, which is one of best things about these large events: fencing people I don't know at all. Especially in the DEs, where you have time to scope them out, do early "reconnaissance", try to figure out tactics and apply them, adjust to changing tactics and new information, and so on. I felt like this DE bout had all that.

By the end of the first period I was down 3-5, but felt like I had learned a lot. Where the proper distance was, recognizing some of his invitation/traps and getting ideas about how to take advantage of them. He kept doing an invitation, opening his outside forearm. I got one hit there early on, but also made some overly deep attacks that failed. During the break Russ emphasized shallow attacks and said something about using a double disengage if I wanted to defeat that arm invitation.

Over the next two periods we both got some nice touches, we both made some mistakes, and the score remained close. I never quite managed to tie it up, but was never more than two points down. I tried to make that double disengage idea work, but never could. Mostly I tried to stay very shallow and keep the distance rather wide. He mostly did the same. Once or twice he fleched and I parried and just missed my riposte. Once he got a nice knee touch on me. Another time I was showing a hand invitation and he hit my hand. Got too close.

At 12-10 I got a touch that felt quite nice—a bit of subtle distance work and broken time, creating an opening. Then, at 12-11 he fleched and almost caught me unready, but I eeked out a double. That made it 13-12. I felt like the next point was particularly important. I could tie it up. But if he got a point, even a double, he'd be at 14. I was doing my best to work the distance, throwing out lots of little feints/shallow target probes, and showing little invitations. He was doing much the same. At some point I made a little invitation just as he made a little feint and pop, he hit my hand. It seemed almost accidental, maybe lucky, but damn, 14-12. He fleched for a double to win.

Afterward we talked a bit. We both thought it was a good, fun bout. We had both been thinking similarly in terms of tactics. I think we both had had a good time seeing what the other did and trying to figure things out. We had never met before. It was a good example of a problem-solving DE. I think we both thought it could have gone either way. We both had several semi-lucky hits and several almost-hit misses.

I watched Michael's next DE, against Zhice (David) Que, who had seeded quite a bit higher (Michael was 48th, Que was 17th). I thought maybe I would see how a better fencer might deal with some of Michael's stuff—maybe I'd see things I could have or should have done. I watched as this "better" fencer kept getting way too close, it seemed to me, and getting hit. And he kept doing it, apparently not figuring out the right distance. The bout wasn't even close (15-5). Michael and I chatted a bit after that. I said that other guy kept getting too close, and he was like I know, wtf?! I watched his next DE, which he also won, against Bela Suveg, who had seeded closer to Michael (49th), but is tough—I've never come close to beating him anyway. Then Michael faced Kaiden Crotchett, who was the top seed, and lost 15-4. Anyway, I had already felt pretty good about my DE. Seeing Michael go on to do as well as he did made me feel even better, despite having lost.

As always with these kind of events, I enjoyed watching the rest of the DEs, checking out all these amazing fencers, trying to learn stuff. The most exciting bout I saw was Svetoslav Dimitrov and Jason Lipton. Lipton got a nice lead and seemed to figure out how to deal with Dimitrov's nice fleches. But Dimitrov, who I think is like 14 and has only been fencing a couple years or so, did really well adjusting his tactics and timing, hitting again and again with such fast fleches. He clawed his way back to tie 14-14. He lost the last point, but even so he did well enough to come in 8th and jump from a D to an A rating. Before facing Lipton he beat Kyle Yamasaki, impressive. That one was also very close, 15-14.

In the end it came down to an unsurprising few, such as Kaiden, Sam Larsen, Henry Lange. In the final 8 Sam and Kaiden had a very close bout. Kaiden had the lead for most of it, but Sam came back in the end to win 15-14. Then Sam took out Jason Lipton 15-3. That made the final Sam and Henry Lange, which was another very close bout. It went to 14-14. Lange won.

PS, it looks like Lipton uploaded videos of his bout with Dimitrov:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noeYxmYZNZg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzMAzVCMYME
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31ljU_VOgJE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zM0RoqQjcIA