WWD Senior Division Championships

WWD Senior Division Championships, 2015, Senior Men's Epee

https://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=27101&highlight_competitor_id=91067&event_id=107256

Came in 16th out of 28, meaning of everyone who won their first DE I had the worst pool results. I beat Kyle Margolies in that DE, and he came in 17th, or best of everyone who lost their first DE.

My pool began nicely, with a win against Johannes Klein, then went bad with four bad losses, 5-2, 5-2, 5-0, 5-1, ouch. Then a 5-4 win. I didn't have high hopes for the DEs, but got Kyle. Even then I didn't have high hopes, but worked hard and pulled it off, yay. Then I had Andrew Lee and lost, but felt like put up a respectable fight. So I was pleased with everything when it was over. And it was nice to see Steven Benack win 1st and get his A, and Andrew Lee take 3rd and get his B.

POOLS

My pool started off as the one six person pool (the others were all seven). But just before we began Jeff Lucas got there—he had missed the close of registration but they let him fence and added him to my pool, making all the pools seven.

For some reason when they set up the pools they didn't make clubmates fence each other first, so my first pool bout wasn't against John Varney but Johannes Klein. Having fenced him in a pool and DE just a few weeks ago I had a decent plan ready, mainly involving absence of blade, careful distance, not making big attacks, feints and body feints, and attacking into his prep or counterattacking as safely as I could. I got the first two points this way—trying to get him to attack, then attacking into his prep. Then he got a point, I forget how. Then I got another, again attacking into his prep, but this time going low to his leg, making it 3-1. I think he was ready for my attacking into his prep that third time, but expected a higher line, so my low line snuck in.

Then my plan broke down a little and he got a couple points, tying it at 3-3. I think I let my focus flag a little, but at 3-3 I got worried and refocused. Even so I got a lucky break at this point. We were maneuvering, looking for advantage, and he found a good timing and fleched. I was caught a bit off guard. I awkwardly parried, sending my blade far wide. He disengaged and, passing me, hit. I felt like I had made a mistake and left myself wide open, but there was a little uncertainty about whether he had hit before passing or not. I thought his hit was probably good, but the ref decided no, it was after the pass. I didn't argue but felt a bit lucky.

So then we were maneuvering again. I was throwing out feints in various ways. At some point he started an advance just as I made a little flick toward his hand, and it landed, woo, 4-3. Then, at the end, I managed another attack into his prep to win 5-3.

So! That felt like a nice start. But I lost the next four bouts, all badly.

First was Andrew Lee. I thought I was being careful and keeping good distance, but he scored with a nice long attack that surprised me stepping in. Then, if I remember right, he made another nice long attack which just touched my knee. I tried to set something up and attacked with my wavy-wave. But it didn't fool him and he easily parried and scored on the riposte. Then he got a great toe touch, catching me totally by surprise. I think that was the way the points went. Maybe I have the order wrong but in any case he got up 4-0. Not good! Throwing caution to the wind I tried my Dragonetti fleche and got a single light. He had responded with a nice counterattack toward my shoulder, but doing the "drag fleche" my shoulder drops down and to the left, which in this case effectively displaced the target he was aiming for. Soon after that he fleched and I counterattacked for a double. I think he wasn't trying too hard for a single light, maybe being okay ending it with a double. Having been down 4-0 I was okay losing 5-2. At least I got two points. Still, ack.

Then I had John Varney. The last time we had a pool bout, a few weeks before, I won, to my surprise. Not this time. I tried my usual stuff with him but was a little hesitant and got confused by his fleches, making parries in wrong directions. A few days before we had fenced in practice and he beat me pretty badly. I asked him after what I had been doing wrong, but he just said he was "practicing his lesson". Whatever he was practicing, it was working on me. Anyway, in this bout he got up 3-0 pretty fast. On his next attack he missed, so I got a point, lucky me. Then he scored again, 4-1, ack. Next he fleched with larger prep blade action. I saw it coming and was able to duck and hit him from below. At least I got one point not due to a mistake of his. Finally I tried a "drag fleche". It failed and he won, 5-2.

Next up, John Mcdonald. I liked fencing him in the last tournament, and did pretty well too. So I was looking forward to this bout. I wasn't expecting to win, just to try my best and have fun. Well, this bout wasn't like the last tournament. He very quickly destroyed me 5-0. I looked at the clock after it was over and it showed 2:42 remaining. He had beaten me in just 18 seconds of fencing time.

Before the bout John Varney told me that Mcdonald was fencing very fast this day. He advised me to "fleche first", and that it would probably be hard to retreat from his fleches fast enough to escape. So I went in planning to attack hard and fast, which is exactly what John did too. It was just that none of my attacks hit before his.

Afterward I told him my plan had been to attack first. He said that made sense but I mostly hadn't attacked first—he had made several attacks immediately right off the line, while I wanted to take a second or two to scope things out or get ready or something. I didn't really think it was wise, or even possible, to attack right off the line without at least a little preparatory footwork. But he got me with an immediate attack to my foot, and another to my leg. I think he did those with big advance lunges, fast enough to do "one tempo", more or less. I was impressed, and I think I will try practicing that kind of thing a little. Seemed like saber-like. And it just occurred to me that the saber event, which John was also in, had been just before epee.

A few times I got my fleching attacks off first, but got hit going in before I could land my point. Afterward I remembered that he had been using a French grip and my attacks were blade avoiding types (like the Dragonetti fleche). When I told him, after, that I had forgotten about his French grip he said something like "yea, you got to deal with my blade if you're attacking".

Well, at least he was nice about giving me a little constructive advice afterward.

After John I had Audun Holland-Goon. After the last three badly lost bouts I hoped I could be better with Audun. Over the last couple of years I've lost to him a number of times. I think I've won a pool bout or two along the way, maybe. I felt like I knew his style fairly well and had a decent chance of winning. But no, it went much like the last few bouts, reaching 4-0 before ending 5-1.

I went in planning to be cautious, knowing his strength is defensive, with good parry-ripostes. I wanted to draw him into attacking me. So I tried pushing him, threatening, feinting, whatever I could to make it seem like I was attacking, hoping to draw his attack. But he just wouldn't bite. Thinking about it now I realize there must be a difference between drawing attacks from someone who likes to counterattack or attack-into-prep, versus someone like Audun who likes to parry-riposte. You might be able to draw an attack-into-prep by feinting in ways that look like "bad prep", but if the person wants to have your blade engaged in a parry maybe you need to actually let them take your blade in order to draw them out. And then? I guess you could use a ceding parry, or retreat so their riposte falls short. Hmm.

Anyway, I can't remember now how Audun got his first point. Probably I got tired of trying to draw an attack and tried to attack into what I hoped was an opening. I probably tried my wavy-wave thing and he parried and scored. Once he was up, even just one point, drawing an attack seemed even harder. He seemed to relax into a very defensive attitude. I kept pushing him back down the strip, feinting and so on. Maybe I should have pushed him all the way to the end. That might be a way to force him to attack. I usually get nervous when the other person is near their end of the strip—doubtlessly in part due to all the fencing I've done with Varney, who loves to be in the box. So I often stop pushing and back off if the other person is getting close to their end. Maybe with someone like Audun it would be better to keep pushing. If someone just won't attack, push them all the way back? Hmm.

Also, before the bout John Varney gave me some advice, using his fingers as blades and showing me a pattern of moving my blade from 6 to 4 and back to 6, or something, ending up with my blade just over his wrist. But I was confused about which finger was whose blade and didn't quite grasp the pattern, and there wasn't time for more. During the bout I kept trying to figure it out, but never quite did.

I'm not sure, but I think Audun got at least one point by attacking as I pushed into distance, surprising me. In any case, once he was up two points I began feeling like I had to try attacking if I hoped to catch up. So I tried my "pool plan" actions one after the other, trying my best to set them up and get past his defenses, but they failed. Either he would parry-riposte and score or at least get my blade out of the way as I fleched by. In this way we got to 4-0.

Then he had an exchange involving, if I remember right, some beats and feints followed by a fleche to his inside. I got a good hit on his chest but the machine showed a single light for him—he had made a late, I thought, counterattack. So I asked the ref, Dan Berke I think it was, to check my epee. Sure enough it wasn't working. I felt a little silly getting another, hooking up, testing, etc, with the score at 4-0. Apparently I had lost hope. I think in the final point I made some kind of fleche attack, he did a parry-riposte and scored, but I managed one of my prime-ish remises and got a double. So I got one point instead of none, losing 5-1. Sigh.

Afterward both Audun and his mom said I should have had my epee checked a couple points before, thinking I had probably lost a point or two. I hadn't felt like I had made any hits in time or I would have had it checked, but who knows. There was only one action I could think of that I might have hit and gotten maybe a double, but if so it wasn't obvious and didn't feel like anything was amiss at the time.

So anyway, after starting nice with my win against Johannes, this pool was no good. Four big losses. My final bout, and the last of the whole pool, was with Jeff Lucas. I can usually beat him and felt like okay, I should be able to at least get one more win out of this pool. But the way things were going I was far from confident. And Jeff has been getting significantly better lately. Still, I thought I could probably do well using absence of blade and distance tactics.

Before we started Jeff said he would be happy to get just one point against me. As we hooked up and tested he joked with me and Dan about it, making up a joke story about rigging the bout so he'd get that one point, or something like that. I got the first point, then he got the second. Our "plan" was working! I got the next point, but then he got one, tying it at 2-2. I think I had made a bad fleche, from too far and ending up off balance infighting instead of passing. Annoyed at myself I pulled off a good "Drag" fleche and got a single. Then I played the absence-distance game, working up to a good feint that got him to make too large a parry, letting me lunge in for a single. So I was up 4-2. Better. Then I made another bad fleche, ending up off balance too close. He scored, making it 4-3. Dan said something like "so much for your guys's plan". Yep. We ended with a double, so I won, but barely at 5-4.

So I had won two, 5-3 and 5-4, and lost four badly. My indicator was a sad -12. I figured I had blown the pool and would have a very bad seed and an impossible DE. The tournament was basically over.

I see now that my win over Johannes resulted in my coming in 5th out of 7, since Johannes had gone one and five, and Jeff had lost all his bouts. My indicator was worse than Johannes's, but my win ratio was higher.

So I was 20th seed out of 28 fencers. I see now that my seed was the lowest of those who had won two bouts. All the pools had seven fencers, so the seeds were all in order of the number of wins. Two had won all six bouts, John Mcdonald and Yuly Suvorov. Six had lost only one, including Andrew Lee, who got 4th seed. Two had lost all their bouts and six had lost all but one. Thanks to those eight I seeded 20th, despite having an indicator worse than the three who seeded below me.

I didn't realize any of that at the time. With 28 fencers were would be only four byes, so there would be no "easy" first DE. I assumed I would get someone very hard, like Varney, or Jay, or Matthew Comes, or someone like that.

DIRECT ELIMINATION

So I was pleasantly surprised when I saw I would fence Kyle Margolies, who was 13th seed. The last few times we've fenced I've lost pretty badly. And given the way I seemed to be fencing this time I thought it was unlikely I would win, but at least it was someone I enjoyed fencing. Plus I felt I had learned quite a bit from the last couple of times we'd fenced—particularly what not to do, what to watch out for, and the need for extra distance.

Had indicators been a point or two different I could have ended up with Luke LaRocque, Robert Tiosejo, or Audun, who all had gone three and three in the pools, like Kyle. If I was given the choice of those four I would probably pick Kyle. Maybe Robert or Audun, but I haven't fenced Robert in forever, and given the way I lost to Audun in the pool, well. And Luke? He's fun to fence, but in a first DE? Yea, no.

Anyway, this DE turned out to be the high point of the tournament and made up for my terrible pool. Because, to my surprise, I won. And decently well too.

I mostly got my points by staying relatively far, having fallen to his long attacks before, and being very careful about attacking, having fallen to his parries, especially four and prime. A few times when I was retreating before his fast but small advances I was able to slow my retreats and let distance collapse just enough to score with a fast direct fleche. Despite my trying to keep distance wide he got a bunch of points with long attacks, often to my leg or knee. He also got two or three hits to my arm on the inside. I was playing a little with holding my arm a bit back and out, vaguely like Steven Benack. I stopped doing that after getting hit on the arm a few times.

One thing I remembered from the last time we fenced was the way he would retreat when I attacked, just enough to be able to make nice parries on my foible, while I wasn't retreating from his attacks and trying to parry too late. So this time I focused on retreating when he made any kind of threat, trying to find that position where I could parry and riposte, or wait for him to fall short and then attack. I think my retreating got him to make larger preparatory actions, which I was sometimes able to attack into. It seems like my retreating plan could have let him force me back to the end of the strip, but I rarely felt like I was too close to the end. Maybe as we got closer to the end he got nervous and backed off. Or he got a little too pushy and came too close, letting me fleche. OR, maybe my feints and body feints kept him from pushing too hard. I've been liking this body feinting stuff.

I tried to keep the score fairly low in the first period, working on being very defensive and shallow, testing things out and trying to get a feel for how the bout might go. Even so the score got up to 7-7. I think I got one more point before time ran out, making it 8-7. Russ talked to me during the break, saying things I mostly was already trying, but reinforcing ideas about what was working and what wasn't. Also some specific ideas that, hmm, I can't remember exactly now. I'm mixing up advice he gave me in the next DE. Kyle got advice from someone, but I can't think who now. I don't think it was Kevin Mar because he was directing bouts, nor John Mcdonald because he was fencing, I think.

In the second period the score stayed tied or a point up or down. We worked up to 10-10. Then things began going my way. I scored attacking into his prep, 11-10. Then again, I retreated and retreated until he started an attack. I attacked into the prep and scored. That time he could have, should have doubled, but missed. Lucky for me, 12-10. Then, again I retreated as he advanced with quick but very small steps. He seemed focused on this footwork, so I slowed/shortened my retreats, letting the distance collapse a little. It felt dangerous as he stepped in closer, but he didn't attack. As he took another step I fleched and hit his shoulder before he could react.

Now the score was 13-10. I tried my best to not get excited about it, thinking "one touch at a time". Remembering stuff Tim Morehouse wrote about in his book I even thought to myself, as I walked to the en guard line, "I'm down, I'm down". Not sure that had any effect. I think the score effected Kyle though. He began to seem frustrated and got more reckless, especially regarding distance. Still, he got the next point, 13-11. Then I got the next, 14-11! I forget the last point exactly. He was trying for a single light, but trying to set something up I was able to sneak in a hit. I'm not sure if we doubled or not. So I won, 15-11 or 15-12, woo! Oddly, on AskFred it shows the score as 14-11, but we didn't even reach the third period.

I felt pretty good about winning. I hadn't expected it and had no idea who would be next. Turned out my next DE was against Andrew Lee, who was 4th seed and had gotten a first round bye. It would be his first DE. Given how he had beaten me badly in the pools, and how he usually beats me, I expected to win even less than I had with Kyle. On the other hand, at least I had a decent idea of his fencing style.

I think I mostly had the right ideas about what to do, which was similar to my approach with Kyle: Keep distance rather wide and retreat, looking for him to fall short, then attack, but carefully! As it turned out I often either did not retreat enough and he'd hit, or I'd retreat more than enough, he'd fall short (very short) and I'd launch an attack from way too far. In the first case, Russ pointed out in the break that Andrew would lunge and I would retreat alright, but then he would fleche out of the lunge and I was being caught flat-footed. I might manage a double in those cases, but it would be better to retreat again. In the second case, well, if I did manage to retreat again and he fell short, great—just don't trying to follow up from too far. I needed to stay away, retreat and let him fall short, then finish, but only if the distance was decent.

As with Kyle, I tried to keep the first period score low. Well, I managed to keep my score low. Not so much with his. I got the first point, which was nice. Then he got one, then another, then another. By the time the period was over he was up 8-3. I don't remember the details well, except that he got a great toe touch and I scored once with that "Dragonetti fleche"—his counterattack going over my shoulder. In the second period, after getting advice from Russ, especially about Andrew's lunge-fleche thing, things began a little better. We traded pointed to 9-5, then I started to catch up a tiny bit, reaching 10-7. Then things fell apart. He got two points to my one, making it 12-8. Then he got the rest except one (probably a double), winning 15-9. Still, I felt like I had done decently. Andrew went on to beat Jay Slater in the next DE, securing 3rd place and earning a B rating.

I stayed and watched the rest, taking videos of the semifinals and final. Mark Benack pointed out how the four people in the semifinals were from the four WWD clubs (the competitive clubs anyway): John Varney SAS Seattle, Matthew Comes WFA Issaquah, Steven Benack RCFC Bellevue, and Andrew Lee MTFC Tacoma. For the division championship that was pretty cool to see. Varney squeezed a win out of Matthew, 9-8. They were tied 8-8 and went into sudden death overtime. Steven beat Andrew 15-13, a good bout. Steven and Varney fenced in the final. I wasn't sure who to cheer for. I mean, you're supposed to root for your clubmate, right? But I like Steven too. And more, if Steven won he would earn his A. While John, well, he's won many tournaments and has been an A for a million years.

Well, Steven won, 15-12. He and his brother were thrilled. It was nice to see. Videos:

Rain City Open Senior Epee

15th Annual Rain City Open, Senior Mixed Epee

https://askfred.net/Results/roundResults.php?seq=1&event_id=116408&highlight_competitor_id=91067

I've been putting off writing about this one. Let's see if I can keep it short. I came in 22nd out of 34.

POOLS

My first bout was with Garrett Armstrong. We hadn't fenced in some time. I remember losing a pool bout 5-4 at SAS a while ago. This time I did better. I didn't write down the points in much detail. I scored one with my "wavy wave". He got one when I went off balance. We doubled once when I fleched. At one point I fleched, got parried and made a last second prime-type action as I passed him. The machine showed I had scored, but I was not sure whether it was after I had passed, or possibly even a floor hit. But the ref gave it to me. If I had been more certain about it not being good I would have said so, but I was just not quite sure and let it stand. I felt a little bad about it. Anyway, after these things I was up 4-3. After some maneuvering I advanced doing the wavy wave and almost launched a full attack but instead paused. He made an overly large parry, creating a nice opening for me to lunge into. That got me a single and a 5-3 win.

Then I had Mark Blom. It was a close bout. I used my usual tactics against him. We got to 3-3, mostly with double touches. Then Mark made a lovely hand hit, 4-3. I kept trying my beats and feints, finally doing a beat-fleche and scoring a single light, 4-4. Then we both continued trying the same thing. I kept trying to set up beat-fleches and he kept trying to pick me off when I attacked. In this way we doubled, and doubled again. We doubled five or six times doing basically the same thing over and over, each trying to get that tiny edge that would make a single. Finally, while maneuvering I thought he stepped too close, so I tried a direct fleche, without a beat. But he wasn't close enough, and/or his picks are just deadlier. He picked my arm on the way in, getting a single light and winning 5-4.

Next was John Mcdonald. It was a fun bout with lots of attacking, fleching, and crashing together. I did alright, generally attacking into his attacks. It was all very fast and crazy. I think I actually got up 3-2. Then he made a very nice accelerated fleche right off the line, starting slow (slowish) and speeding up, catching me reacting too slowly. That was a nice one. Then he got an awesome leg touch and took the lead 4-3. He fleched again for the last point, which I managed to turn into a double. So I lost 5-4. But it was very fun. And I did pretty well, especially considering our pool bout in the next tournament, where he beat me 5-0 in about twenty seconds.

Then I had Charles Bertone and did well. I got the first point with my wavy-wave attack, and the second in a way I don't remember. Then he scored when I made a bad parry, 2-1. I got the rest of the touches after that, winning 5-1. Mainly I scored when he made mistakes like big parries to my feints, and also with direct fleches when the distance collapsed just enough.

My last pool bout was against Paul Duchow. It began slow, each of us being defensive and cautious. I forget exactly how the first points went, but we slowly got to 2-2. The only specific touch I remember was a nice hit to my knee. Since we had been going slowly there was less than a minute left at 2-2. That was when things went downhill. He got a point in a way I don't remember. Once he was up he became even more defensive, while I tried to set up attacks, hoping to at least tie again before time ran out. I tried to create openings but found it hard. Eventually I launched a risky fleche. It almost worked—I could see my point just reaching his shoulder, but not enough to score. He got me with a counterattack or parry, making it 4-2, with little time left. I tried my Dragonetti fleche, but it failed and he scored, winning 5-2.

So I was two and three out of the pools. Two of my loses were 5-4, and my wins were 5-1 and 5-3. So I came in 4th place out of six, with an indicator of +1. Well...could be worse.

DIRECT ELIMINATION

There were 34 fencers, so the DEs started with a round of 64 and almost everyone getting a bye. Sam Larsen was 1st seed, no surprise there. John Mcdonald was 2nd, which made me feel good about my decent pool bout with him.

I was 22nd seed and got paired with 10th seed Matthew Comes. He beat me fairly easily, the end score being 15-8.

Beforehand I got advice from Sam, who summed it up by saying "out-stupid his stupid". He didn't see the bout, but afterward, seeing me with my jacket off was like, "What happened? Were you not stupid enough?" I replied, "Oh I was stupid." We jokingly agreed that there's a fine line between being too stupid and just stupid enough. Or something like that.

Anyway, the details of his advice, along with some from Russ and some of my own analysis, goes something like this. Get Matthew to attack from too far, falling short, then "crush the distance". He likes to make long attacks and tries to time them to when you are advancing or at least unable to retreat. The key is seeing when he's launching a real attack—ignore all the "stupid" things that are not real attacks; don't attack into the stupid—easier said than done for me. Also, you need fast retreats so he falls short, then quick direction change to crush the distance before he can recover decently. Of course, that kind of rapid direction change is something Sam is way better at than me. I tend to retreat too far (if I manage to retreat at all), then take too long to change direction ("too long" being measured in fractions of a second, but still). So too often I'd end up attacking after he fell short, but from too far and too late, after he had recovered. And that's just suicide.

Another bit was, when crushing the distance make sure you don't end up hanging out in close quarters—if you don't score right away either rush past him or get out fast. I did better than I had in the past about avoiding infighting with him. He "only" got me once with his behind the head thing. Two times he ducked my "crushing" fleche and hit me from below.

In short, distance, balance, let him attack long, falling short then shifting fast, crushing, then hitting or passing fast, avoiding the behind the head thing. Piece of cake, right? Hrm.

OTHER STUFF

I had to leave before the event was over, so I didn't get to see much after the final 8. While cooling off I took a video of Sam fencing Paul Duchow, but left soon after.

To my non-surprise Sam won 1st place. I only saw one of his bouts, but looking at the scores none were close—his DEs were 15-4, 15-3, 15-8, 15-6, and, in the final against Kaiden Crotchett, 9-5. Sheesh.

Despite being an A2 event the only rating change was for Henry Duchow, who came in 3rd place and went from a D2015 to a B2015. He was 1st in his pool, losing only to Matthew Comes and getting 7th seed. In the DEs he beat Jeff Lucas, then Tobias Lee in a very close 15-14 bout. Then he beat John Mcdonald 15-8 before finally losing to Kaiden Crotchett.

Rain City Open Vet Epee

15th Annual Rain City Open
Vet Combined Men's Epee

https://askfred.net/Results/roundResults.php?seq=1&event_id=116410&highlight_competitor_id=91067

Came in third, got a medal and a t-shirt, yay. Of course there were only seven of us, and so, with two 3rd places over half of us medaled.

This, along with the more difficult Senior Epee event of this Rain City Open, a couple days later, reminded me of the Portland ROC last October—where I got third place in the small vet event and was crushed in the larger, harder Senior event. At least I didn't get crushed quite as badly this time in the Senior event, which I'll write about in the next post.

Pools

Since there were only seven of us we had a one, slightly larger than average pool. It was nice to get to fence everyone.

Started off with my clubmate, John Varney. First bout of the pools too. To my surprise I began strong, getting the first two points, taking my time and being as careful as I could. Then he scored with a nice fleche into my advance and confused parry. I continued being very cautious. I'd never beaten John in a tournament bout of any kind and my basic strategy the last few times was to just try and keep the score low. I'd be fine with time running out. So I tried keeping long distance, pretending to be pulled by his slow retreats, killing time, then backing off, opening distance, waiting. After a while he attacked with a fleche but I managed to parry and score a single light on the riposte. I think his fleche had been from a bit too far. Maybe my keeping wide distance was working. So I was up 3-1. I had a moment of feeling good, like I could win. But the instant I thought that I pushed it away. I've been up on him many times (usually in practice but in some tournaments too) and lost. One touch at a time. Defense. Kill time.

Maybe all the practice fencing we have done over the last three years was finally paying off. I felt like I knew what do to, although not sure I could. But I tried. Lots of wide distance and body feints, half-lunges, "half/pretend" fleches. My main goal was to kill time, but I knew I had to stay relatively threatening. If I let him set up something he could probably devastate me. As long as my body feints and such were under control maybe he'd launch an attack I could deal with.

And that's what happened. He launched a fleche from a bit too far. I like to think it was into one of my false fleches and quick retreats, resulting in his attack falling short and giving me a chance to counterattack. My counterattack almost missed, just barely clipping his shoulder for another single light and a 4-1 score. I was amazed. Still, this was the point where he usually turned the tables on me and eeked out a win.

I glanced at the clock (happy that the time is displayed on the score boxes at RCFC). There were about 50 seconds left. I should be able to prevent John's getting four single lights in 50 seconds, but I knew it was quite possible for him to still win. I continued my full defensive thing, even more trying to kill time, pushing and pulling distance—trying to keep a very long distance while not retreating all the way to my end of the strip. After about 15 or 20 seconds he attacked and I managed to turn it into a double. So I won, 5-2. There's a first for everything. Of course it is quite likely John wasn't properly warmed up (although I didn't think I was either), nor trying his absolute best. And he did go on to win every single bout after this one. Still, it made me happy, and I think I might have impressed a couple other people watching. Later Mark Blom said something about how he just can't figure John out. I said something about how I've been practicing with him for three years now, usually multiple times a week. We've certainly fenced over a hundred times, maybe two hundred. That's gotta help.

My second bout was with John Sharpe, from Spokane, who I had never fenced before. I didn't get a chance to watch him before our bout and went in knowing little more than seeing he was left-handed and used a French grip. I readied myself for left-handed and French grip type tactics. And also for patience. I've been trying to look at fencers I don't know as puzzles. As something to explore slowly, trying to scout out strengths and weaknesses, while also working on my own deceptiveness—trying to make it seem like I have weaknesses that are actually strengths.

But right off the bat John confused me by hugging his inside strip edge (his right side, my left). Usually lefties tend to hug the outside edge, but there he was way over on the inside edge. So that was weird, but I figured I ought to be able to use it to my advantage. I worked on setting up attacks to his outside line, since it seemed so open. But he was faster than I expected, and accurately picked off my arm from the inside a couple of times. I wised up a little and was more careful about exposing my arm, and I drifted more to the center of the strip. Somehow we both fleched at the same time and ended up in a crashing double, making the score 3-1. Then we did it again, 4-2. I tried hard to focus on one touch at a time, patiently looking for openings and keeping the distance wider than I had at first. We had some kind of exchange during which I managed to sneak in a single light. I forget exactly how. A score of 4-3 seemed much better, but still I needed two single lights. Well, he attacked and I countered and we doubled again. So I lost 5-4. Oh well, not bad, I figured, for starting out down 2-0. I felt like I had figured something out and dealt alright with a surprising style.

Next up was Brent Farnsworth. Here maybe I underestimated someone I felt I should be able to beat. I began with a kind of blade out, moving in and out kind of thing. He quickly took me in a nice bind and scored. I think we doubled after that and then he got a couple points to my one, making the score 4-2. He was doing nice strong binds. I adjusted by switching to a more absence of blade approach, trying to work the distance. I got him with a fleche as he stepped in, making it 4-3. Then I tried it again, but he managed to counterattack my fleche for a double, winning 5-4. Doh.

Then I had Johannes Klein. We've fenced a bunch and I feel like I sort of know what to do. But he is smart and quick to take advantage of any tiny lapse. I followed the advice I had in my little notebook, which suggested keeping my point aimed at his wrist and staying shallow, working for hand picks and the like. That meant having my blade out a lot, and he scored several times with nice beat and bind fleches. I could not quite figure out what he was doing. His beats often seemed very small, but worked like a charm. I tried a fleche of my own and it failed badly. So he was up several points, 4-2 I think.

I switched tactics. Instead of trying to keep my point aimed at his wrist, which basically gave him my blade to beat and bind, I went with absence. I increased my bouncing and used more body feints, hoping to lure him into distance and bad attacks. Not so easy with Johannes! But I managed to get it to work a couple times. Basically I'd make almost real attacks, drawing a real counterattack from him. Then I'd fleche into the opening, if there was one, perhaps with a beat. I got two singles this way, crawling back to a tied 4-4 score. Then, as I kept trying the same tactic I ended up bouncing just a little too close, into his distance. He did not hesitate to take advantage and score a single, winning 5-4. So after my nice start with Varney I was down one and three. With two more to go. Ack.

Next was Jeff Lucas. As with Brent things did not begin very well and I had a mindset of thinking I ought to win. I forget the exact details, but I was being fairly aggressive and it wasn't working. He got up a point or two. So I slowed down and, as in the last two bouts, switched to a more defensive approach, using absence of blade, body feints, and generally working distance. I was able to either lure him in just too close, letting me score with a fleche, or draw attacks from too far, which I could parry-riposte or counterattack. From being down 4-3 I managed two single lights this way, getting 4-4, then luring an attack from too far, creating an opening I could score in. So I eeked out a 5-4 win.

My last pool bout was with Mark Blom. We go back and forth. In the last tournament, the SIV, he beat me badly. This time went a lot better. I think I was quicker on my feet this time. I continued with the absence of blade, feints and body feints things, more or less—couple with hard beats, mostly upward from my absence position, trying to make openings. In these ways I managed to get up 3-1. Much better than at the SIV where he got up 4-1. At 3-1 I tried a beat-fleche, but he was able to recover and score a single, making it 3-2. Then I scored with a kind of broken time upward beat, pause, go attack. I felt good at 4-2 and took up a fairly defensive, waiting approach, knowing he had to attack. Eventually he did. I counterattacked straight in and got a double, winning 5-3.

So I came out of the pools three and three. And my three losses were all 5-4. My wins were 5-2, 5-3, and 5-4. So I had a positive indicator, yay. This put me third place for the pools. John Sharpe had also gone three and three, and our indicators were tied at +3. In such cases the tie is broken by the higher "touches scored", I think. And since I had 27 to his 25 I was third to his fourth. That was close!

Direct Elimination

As third seed I was paired with the sixth seed, Brent Farnsworth. Had I been fourth seed I would have had fifth seed Mark Blom. Who knows if I would have been able to beat Mark in a DE. Brent though—after the pools, where I felt like I figured out what to do, but too late to win—I had my tactics ready. Mainly I wanted to avoid his beats and binds and try to lure him into distance mistakes. This seemed to be his main strength and weakness, that I could see anyway. So I went with strong absence of blade and active, often broken footwork. It worked. I got him to step in too close, letting me fleche into his advances. I got up a few points. He seemed to not know what to do with my absence of blade. Sometimes he tried to beat my blade despite it being very low. This made me feel like I was doing the right thing. I have forgotten the exact details, but I think I got a healthy lead and kept it, winning 10-5.

It was nice to feel like I learned a lesson in the pools, losing to him, and was able to adjust tactics appropriately. I think afterwards he said he didn't know what to do with my absence of blade approach, and I tried to explain what I had been trying to do with it.

With just seven of us winning that first DE guaranteed me at least third place and a medal, which was my only real goal for this tournament. Yes, I'm still at the point where getting a medal feels special. Even if it only takes one DE, I'll take it! I tried to use this feeling of "I made my goal" to approach the next DE with calmness and enjoyment—knowing that that might help me win, but also knowing it was true: I'd be okay losing and coming in third. If nothing else my kids would enjoy seeing another medal on the bust of Beethoven.

My next DE was against Johannes Klein, who was second seed. Similar to Brent, I felt like I had figured out some tactical things in the pool. And like with Brent I tried using a lot of absence of blade, distance work, feints and body feints. I tried to mix things up a little more, offering invitations at long distance and such (I don't think Johannes fell for any of those). It was a very close bout. We got to 4-4, then doubled, then doubled again. At 6-6 the first period ran out and we had our minute break. I had no one to coach me, so I just breathed and relaxed and tried to not fret.

During the break I decided to start the next period with the same tactics but much faster footwork. In part I was thinking maybe I could tire Johannes out a bit and maybe he would be more prone to making a mistake. I should have remembered that he doesn't really seem to get tired easily, and rarely makes mistakes. But I was also thinking that faster footwork might help draw attacks that I could take advantage of.

Whatever my reasoning I started the next period with fast, aggressive footwork, while still holding mainly to absence of blade and looking for counterattacks, second intention, countertime, etc. He remained rather calm as I bounced in and out, feinting and trying to be confusing, and slowly pushing him back down the strip. And then, I bounced just slightly too close. It was a small mistake but Johannes was waiting for it. He attacked straight into my bounce-advance and scored a single light, taking the lead 7-6. Whoops. In pushing my footwork activity up I had crossed into a region of slightly less control. I suspect he could see this, and perhaps could see patterns in my footwork that I wasn't aware of. So when I made that small mistake he was quite ready.

Walking back to on guard I realized these things and adjusted by slowing down a little. With someone like Johannes mistakes of footwork are deadly, and I can't quite manage that level of aggressive bouncing without losing a bit of control. Being down a point and knowing we had been doubling a lot, I tried being a bit more cautious, reverting to more body feinting, trying to draw one of his big parries/beats/counters. Things went very much as they had before my mistake. If I remember right we doubled to 8-7, then he got a single, 9-7. Then we doubled again. So I lost 10-8. Well, considering how I've done with Johannes in the past I thought that was pretty good. And I learned something. Several things. Something about staying in control. And something about how rarely Johannes makes mistakes!

In the final John Varney beat Johannes 10-7. I don't think anyone was surprised that they took first and second place.

So I got third, and another "bronze" medal to go with the four others, and the one silver I have. I've come in second and third a few more times than that, but in tournaments that did not have medals. Still never first place. I think that is my main goal now. Going up the ratings would be nice, but eh. Getting a D would be just fine. C or higher though, I'm not even sure I want that these days. It would put me out of Div 3 for one. I feel like I ought to be competitive in Div 3, but would probably get crushed a lot in Div 2. Plus this year I only just qualified for Div 3 at Nationals, but not Div 2. I'm realizing that going up in the ratings isn't always a good thing, although a D would be nice. Mostly I am enjoying feeling like I am getting better, slowly. Someday I'd like to take first place in a tournament, even if it is just a seven person vet tournament.

Seattle International Veteran's Cup 2015

Seattle International Veteran's Cup 2015
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.

WWD Div II/III/Y14 Divisional Qualifier, 2015

WWD Div II/III/Y14 Divisional Qualifier, 2015

https://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=27049&highlight_competitor_id=91067&event_id=107105#107105

I was about to start this post by saying "I did better than I feared but worse than I hoped", but before I began I looked at the post I wrote for last year's Div II/III qualifying tournament and that's exactly how I began that post. Weird. I guess that's true for a lot of tournaments I've gone to.

I was surprised, looking at last year's post, that my DE was with Kyle Margolies, just like this year. I remember that earlier DE clearly, but had forgotten what tournament it was. Ever since that loss I've been eager for a rematch. I was happy to get it this time, but lost again, and worse than last time, and for reasons fairly similar to last time. But I'll get to that later.

First, apparently I qualified for Div 3 at Nationals. First time I've managed that. I can probably even go, which is exciting. I've never been to even a NAC-level tournament—nothing higher than ROCs. I didn't understand very well how the qualification calculation works. Before the tournament I read on its info page how the "top 25% in each event will qualify", and how a person who has already qualified will not be counted in determining that 25%. An email went out listing the people who had already qualified and it seemed that there was only one for men's epee, Andrew Lee. With 25 fencers signed up and the top 25% qualifying, that seemed to mean only the top six or so would qualify. That seemed like a long shot for me, and after I lost my first DE I knew I would come in no higher than 9th, so I figured I didn't qualify.

I hadn't realized that the calculation is done separately for Div 2 and Div 3, and that people with a C rating can't fence in Div 3 and so aren't counted. Or something like that. In any case, after losing my DE I spend the rest of the tournament watching and assuming I hadn't qualified. After it was over I was looking at the results on one of the TVs and was totally surprised to see my name followed by, in the "qualified for" column, D3ME, VETME. I think I giggled like a little kid and ran around telling anyone who would listen that I had qualified, then felt a little foolish.

I'm a little concerned as I write this because I have no other confirmation of this other than seeing that results screen at RCFC. I tried to find confirmation online but can't. I figure in a few days the info will get to the regional and national USFA offices and put online somewhere. I thought AskFred would show the same info that RCFC had displayed via the FencingTime app, but AskFred doesn't show qualifications, as far as I can tell. Also, I thought the in-club results screen showed me as coming in 12th, but AskFred says 13th. And since it appeared that I only just barely qualified for Div 3 I wonder if maybe a mistake had been made yesterday and corrected before sending the results to AskFred, and I didn't actually qualify. I almost took a picture of the results screen at RCFC, but that seemed a little silly. Now I wish I had! Ah well, I'm sure I'll have a firm answer soon enough.

Anyway, on to the fencing. I really enjoyed this tournament. As always I could have done better, but there were a bunch of good moments. In the pools I beat Andrew Lee and Carlo Malaguzzi, and Shawn Dodge too. Never done that before in a tournament with any of those guys, I don't think. On the other hand I lost to Jeff Johnson despite being tied at 3-3. Lost rather badly to Mark Blom and Charlie Muñoz. Fenced Jameson Lu twice (two sets of pools), the first time losing badly, the second time doing much better, getting to 4-4, but losing the last touch.

Another thing—after having a lot of slow pool starts lately I thought I would benefit from a longer warm-up. I tried to get there an hour early but didn't have quite as much time as planned. Still, I did a fair bit of jogging and footwork warming up, which I think went a long way toward getting me ready. I got in a warm-up bout with Kyle too. After the last tournament I had decided I ought to work harder in warm up bouts, to help get myself into a better place for the first actual bout. So I worked harder with Kyle. I suspect he was taking it a bit easy because I scored quite a lot until the last few, when he seemed to take it up a notch or two.

I also brought music, which a lot of people do but I never have. Ideally I would have more appropriate/useful ear buds or headphones, and my ipod is a thousand years old and the size of a dictionary. AND I wasn't sure I had very much in the way of good music for warming up and getting amped. In the end I listened to just one track, several times—Squarepusher "Journey to Reedham". It really hit the right spot for me. A fast beat with drum-n-bass type twitchy rhythmic weirdness, edgy hard-sync'ed synths, and a simple but very happy, confidence-building theme.

FIRST POOL

Right off the bat I had to fence Shawn Dodge, since he's my clubmate. We had the first bout of the pool. I was a bit worried since my first pool bouts have been off lately and Shawn can be tough. But it seemed like he was a bit off (he got better, but seemed to have that "first pool offness" I was worried I'd have), and I felt much more on than usual. That extra warming up and music was certainly part of it.

He started off with a fleche, pretty quickly. I picked his hand from below as he came in. The day before I spent some time watching videos, especially one I took a while ago of Tristan Krueger and Cole Mallette. I liked the way Tristan kept threatening, and often hitting Cole's hand from below, with fast retreats. I had that kind of thing in my head and tried to do something similar in a number of my bouts this day. I started out with Shawn with this kind of thing in mind, so when he fleched I was quite ready to hit his hand from below. Even so, the fleche came fast and I felt a bit lucky that my hit landed. I wasn't retreating the way Tristan did in that video (I'm not sure I can, at least not with the speed and skill Tristan has, he's miles better than me), and if I had missed his hand Shawn's fleche would have landed, no doubt. Still, it felt like a nice start.

Then we manuevered a little until I tried a beat-fleche and scored. Shawn tends to hold his blade out and use fast disengages and accurate picks, but sometimes it makes beats and binds easier. Usually he recovers from beats and retreats fast enough to at least get a double if not a single. But I got this one. And then, well I'm not entirely sure how the points went, but I think I got the next one too, in a way I don't remember, making it 3-0. Then I managed to put my hand on his point, trying some attack, oops, 3-1. Then we had some weird infighting thing and doubled, I think, 4-2. And then he fleched from a little too far and I caught him in a parry and landed my riposte. So 5-2, a good start for once.

Next up I had Jameson Lu. We've fenced a number of times. I mainly remember a DE we had at SAS a while ago during which I had some insights and after which Russ gave me more ideas. This time I felt like I had a good chance and was confident. But he beat me 5-1, mostly with picks and flicks to my hand or forearm. The one point I got was a counter-beat from an absence of blade position—something Russ has been showing me lately. I hadn't planned to use beats with Jameson, but that one worked. A couple of other times I used beats, despite my plan to not, and they failed, and I got hit. At one point I tried to set up a good chance to use a bind and it worked—I bound him in 8 and it felt quite good in the moment, but then I missed, giving him the opportunity to escape the bind and hit, which he did.

Third bout was with Jeff Johnson. I don't think we had fenced much or at all for a while. I mainly remember fencing him a few times at RCFC open fencing last summer. I knew he had developed quite a lot since then and would probably be a challenge. Then again, I had watched him fence several times in recent tournaments, so I had an idea of what to expect. I thought my "Tristan-like" tactic might be viable. Jeff is a tall leftie french-grip counterattacking kind of fencer. He often holds his hand back pretty far and sometimes high, exposing his lower hand in what I assume is usually an invitation-trap kind of thing. Still, I thought I might be able to hit his hand the way Tristan was hitting Cole's. I just had to be careful about not getting too close and being quick in my retreats.

This plan worked fairly well. I got the first point in exactly this way, hitting his hand from below. I can't remember the next couple of points. I think he got up 3-2 before I got another hand hit like that, making it 3-3. Somewhere in there I remembered he might be vulnerable to hard beats, what with the french grip and all. I started throwing out very hard beats, especially that counter-beat I'd been working on. I seem to be able to counter-beat very hard, yet disguise it fairly well—although it depends a lot on how the other person is holding their blade. My beats threw his blade way out of line and once it seemed I nearly knocked the blade out of his hand altogether. I probably had a couple good chances to score, but I was hesitant. I hadn't been beating with the intention of launching a big attack. I was more just trying it out to see what might happen. Probing for ideas. If there had been a really big opening I planned to go for it. And there probably was a big opening or two, but I hesitated and felt off balance. I was a bit surprised with how well the hard beats worked. After the bout Marshall said I had been leaning way forward with way too much weight on my front foot. In hindsight I realize that my "Tristan-like" plan had played into this. I was trying to sneak in to hit the shallow target and retreat fast, and this got me leaning and reaching too much, when I ought to have kept more balanced and done it with footwork. Part of it was leaning in for the extra reach, and part was having weight on my front foot in order to push back for quick escapes. But with too much weight on my front foot I was not able to take advantage of the openings created by my hard beats. It was a good lesson in balance and footwork though.

Anyway, when the score was 3-3 I suddenly remembered Charlie's leftie flick idea, as something useful against lefties. So I tried it, but in an impatient, impulsive way, without a good setup or escape plan. Also, I haven't practiced it much. In short, it failed and Jeff scored an easy hit. Shawn pointed out after how I got impatient at 3-3. That was probably the worst time to try something risky that I haven't practiced much. It just popped into my head like "oh yea, that's a cool thing to use with lefties", and blam, I impulsively tried it.

Then, at the end, well, Jeff had been doing a lot of little beat or sweep like motions, off and on the whole bout. Even when I used absence of blade he still seemed to be trying to beat my blade, despite being out of reach. For a bit I had my blade out and let him beat it a little, trying to figure out a way to take advantage of this. He seemed to be doing it in a fairly consistent repetitive way and I felt I ought to be able to lull him into a pattern somehow, then break it. The obvious thing was to disengage one of the beats, since he seemed to be doing them in a rather predictable way. But I assumed he wanted me to do a disengage attack because the pattern seemed a little too obvious. So I started working out some kind of second intention thing, where I would offer my blade and let him set up this beat pattern, then disengage and make a feint attack, which would, in theory, draw his real attack, which would fall short because I had only feinted, or would be in a form I could parry, bind, or beat. Yes, this is what fencing is all about, deceptions within deceptions! But when I offered my blade, looking for his beat-pattern, I got a little too close and he simply lunged straight in, hitting me blam on the mask. So much for complicated plans. So he won, 5-3. Ah well, I felt like I learned a lot in that one, not just about Jeff but generally about tactics and footwork, and so on.

Next I had Andrew Lee, who usually (always?) beats me in tournaments. This year he and Toby have come up to SAS a few times for open practice fencing. I think having had some of this more relaxed open fencing, where you feel free to try things you might not in a tournament, and everything is friendly and fun, helped make me feel more relaxed facing Andrew in this tournament. Even so I did not expect to win, although I certainly was going to try my best. It turned out quite interesting. I knew that Andrew is very patient and how dangerous it is to get too close or to over commit. I also knew that I tend toward not being patient enough, being impulsive. So I started out by being as careful and patient as I could, and keeping the distance quite wide. We both manuevered into and out of distance, sometimes throwing out feints and what not. I tried some low risk shallow attacks, including a try for his foot (fell short) but nothing too big. A few times the distance collapsed a bit, especially when I got pushed toward my end of the strip. Keeping the distance wide meant I was giving him the ability to push me back. I tend to get worried when I'm near the strip end and am prone to making bad attacks. I've been working on being more comfortable near the end, in part because other fencers often get a little impulsive and/or start closing distance a little too much or a little recklessly. I hadn't actually planned to make this a tactic in this bout, yet I kept keeping the distance open and retreating a lot. A couple times, when we were starting from our on guard lines I even started with a retreat, like Krystal often does—opening the distance even wider and inviting the other person to come to you.

I'd like to say I was working on this tactic all along on purpose, but really I was mostly afraid of Andrew's fleche and trying to be patient and not do anything rash. In hindsight I think it got him thinking about attacking more than he might otherwise. At one point he fleched from just slightly too far. I couldn't score but I was able to prevent him from scoring. Another time, near my end I think, distance closed and we both made shallow-ish attacks that brought us even closer and quickly became infighting. We both tried prime-like infighting things. Mine hit while his went between my legs as I kinda did the avoidance dance.

Anyway, all this brought us to 2-3, with Andrew up a point and time perhaps about half used. Again I'd like to say I had this plan all along but really it was just something that popped into my head and I acted on. A couple days before I was editting videos from the Ray Coates tournament and had been admiring Matthew Comes's style. Sometimes he fleches right off the line and frequently scores. It seems to be one of his dependable "go to" moves. A few other people have a nice "off the line" fleche too. In editting videos I ended up watching a couple of these fleches of his in slow motion, checking out the way he comes off the line in particular. It's too far to fleche right off the line. People who are good at this take a step or two first. The obvious trick to it is doing that first step or two in a non-threatening way that hides the coming fleche. One way is with a calm walking, with a crossover perhaps. But I think this overly "calm" start might actually alert better fencers, it's too easy to see the calmness as a ruse. I'm still not sure how best to do it, but I'm thinking it ideally ought to look very much like the way you've been starting in the bout up to then.

With Andrew I had mostly been starting with a fairly big step that fell into a bit of bouncing, usually bouncing slowly backwards. At 2-3 for some reason I remembered watching Matthew Comes and thinking about his fleche off the line and decided to try it. So I started with a big step, fell into bouncing, but bounced forward rather than backward then fleched. It worked! In the moment I didn't think about the bigger picture and how my more defensive approach up til then might have set things up nicely for a surprise fleche like this. Who knows, maybe my subconscious is smarter than I am. Anyway, after that I continued being more agressive. I forget exactly how, but we doubled, making it 4-4. And then, we maneuvered a little and doubled, thrown out. Then again, we doubled in pretty much the same way. And then, I think  I used an up-beat hoping to hit his wrist from below. He counterattacked, I missed his wrist but continued to the body, and we doubled again, thrown out for the third time.

Three doubles at 4-4 can feel a little funny. What is this, saber? We both laughed a little, I think. Scott was the ref and he had been joking off and on between bouts about how our pool would be done first, but then realizing he had the one larger pool so maybe it wouldn't. Then he had joked about how he wanted to be done first. There was some back and forth joking between bouts about how we should fence faster or something. After Andrew and I doubled three times at 4-4 Scott said something, I forget exactly what, just a little joke, but to the effect of "come on!". That, plus the way we had doubled three times in more or less the same basic way, and how in epee people often break patterns after three of "the same" things—all that made me think Andrew would do something different, something maybe a little impatient. I guessed he might do a quick fleche. I was right! Not only was I thinking he would fleche but he did it from a bit too far. So I was able to counterattack and score a single to win. Whew. What a strangely tactical bout.

My last bout in the first pool was with Colin Skone. I think he is still a bit of a beginner and he hadn't been doing very well so far—except for beating Jameson Lu. I felt pretty confident and it went well. I don't remember the specific details very well. I think it was mostly about working distance and drawing attacks with feints and such. I won 5-1.

So a pretty good first pool. I was three and two, with an indicator of +2. Third place—Andrew and Jeff had both done four and one. Andrew took 1st place because his one loss was 5-4 (with me), while Jeff's was 5-1 (with Andrew).

This tournament had two sets of pools, which is a format I like. But in this case it would have been better for me without the second pool, since I didn't do nearly as well. I seeded 7th out of 21 after this first pool and 12th after the second. But, hmm, looking now, if there hadn't been a second pool I think I would have gotten Charlie for my first DE, so perhaps I was in trouble either way.

SECOND POOL

In this pool I had two bad losses, one very close loss, and one close win. It was a little weird. I knew Charlie would be tough, and he was. I thought I could beat Mark Blom, but I lost badly. I thought Carlo would be a major challenge, but I beat him, to my surprise. And I got a second chance with Jameson Lu, who had beaten me so badly in the first pool. I did much better this time, getting to 4-4, but lost the last point.

First up, Charlie Muñoz, my clubmate. He won, 5-2. He fenced better, to put it simply. One time I had a great chance to hit, but plain missed and he hit. And at the end I attacked too impulsively and he easily hit. One unusual and somewhat annoying bit: I got a lovely hit on his hand from below. I felt like I had set it up nicely and made an accurate, very nice hit. I felt quite pleased. But Scott, who was reffing (by chance he reffed both my pools and my DE), gave me a yellow card an annulled the touch, saying my back foot had gone far to my right, well off strip, before I hit. I'm sure it had—I have a bad habit of sweeping my back foot to the right anyway, and with Charlie being a leftie I was hugging the right side of the strip. AND, the ungrounded strips at RCFC are awfully narrow! Ah well.

I didn't write down much about my next bout with Mark Blom, which I lost 5-2. I was planning to try and use beats like I had with him in Portland a while back. Perhaps he was expecting me to take this approach. I had a couple of good openings that I missed. I think I was tensing my shoulder too much and using my arm and wrist instead of my fingers too much. I made an effort to relax and use my fingers more, but got impatient near the end.

Then I had Carlo Malaguzzi. I don't think I've ever beaten him in a tournament before although we've fenced enough for me to get more and more of a clue what to do, not to do, watch out for, etc. I think I did decently this time, but still not great, making some mistakes and missing some. But he also made some mistakes and missed some. I think he was having an off day. Even so it was close and there was some luck involved.

The first few points are jumbled in my mind. Once I tried a counter-beat attack but went too large and missed. Another time he scored with one of his nice binding fleches. After that I tried to avoid doing things that would let him fleche with a bind. I tried to not give him my blade, used absence and so on. I think this played into my missing a couple more of my attacks. One time he got me on the leg. In this kind of way we got to 3-3. Then he launched an attack that could have, should have scored, but he missed and I scored, 4-3. And then I attacked and I missed, he hit, 4-4. Then he made a nice attack but, yes, missed, just barely. I felt his tip go by my chest. I managed to land a counterattack and won, 5-4. It felt good to finally win against Carlo in a tournament, but that wasn't the best way to do it. Way too many misses on both sides.

Next I had Jameson Lu again. After he destroyed me in the first pool I was ready with a different approach. Charlie, who had beaten him badly, gave me good advice too. In short the basic idea was to be passive and retreat a lot, knowing he will attack a lot. To try and lull him into thinking about his attacks even more than usual, then attacking when he doesn't expect it. Something like that. I was not that passive though. I couldn't help, or thought I ought to use feints and shallow engagements in order to encourage attacks and maybe make openings. I didn't do as well as Charlie, who had won 5-1, but I did better than before, getting 3-4, then 4-4. But he got the last one and won 5-4. One thing Charlie pointed out afterward was how when I did find an opening and fleched I made straight direct fleches, but Jameson is fast and I'd either get a double or lose the point altogether. I ought to have done binding fleches. Also I might have done better by being more passive and patient, waiting and lulling more. Then when he did attack and his blade was out, going for the surprise fleche, with a bind.

Anyway, so in the second pool I was one and four, with an indicator of -6. Not as good as the first pool. In fact, I see now, tied with Carlo for last place. We both won one, scored 13 touches and lost 19. After the first pool I was seeded 7th, but after this one I dropped to 12th. There were 21 fencers altogether and the five who ended up seeded above 16 were cut. So I made the cut, which was my first concern. In last year's qualifying event there were 31 fencers, 24 promoted to DEs, and I seeded 18th. Fairly similar in a way. And in both cases I lost my first DE. But with fewer fencers this time, or maybe fewer D and unders at the top, I managed to squeak into qualifying for Div 3, while last year I didn't.

DIRECT ELIMINATION

I smiled when I saw I would fence Kyle Margolies in the DEs. Just like last year, only this time I thought I knew better how to win. His fencing has changed in various way, but I had gotten the chance to watch him a bit recently, and even warm up with him before this event, so I figured I had some good information. Last year he had taken an early lead but I had crawled back to within a point or two, before he gained in the last few points, winning 15-11. This time, alas, not even that good, I lost 15-9.

My basic plan was to be as fast as I could, getting in and out quickly, drawing attacks and retreating so he fell short. Waiting for mistakes and openings, then attacking fast and strong. Since last year he's switched to using a french grip and, although I was well aware of this, perhaps I let myself get too close a few times. And when I thought I saw an opening and fleched I too often found myself parried—often in prime, and hit. He quickly got a big lead. I tried to fall back a bit and rethink things, but he pressed the attack and scored a bunch more. As time ran out on the first period I got defensive, wanting time to run out so I could regroup. With about ten seconds left he made another big attack and scored again, which got me annoyed at myself. Can't I even just kill a few seconds? At the end of the period it was 12-6. Not good.

Shawn came over and talked with me, saying I seemed to have a hesitation, but more important, he pointed out how Kyle was making a half or full retreat when I attacked, putting him in the perfect position to make a good parry, while I wasn't retreating from his attacks, and so failing to make good parries. I had been trying to retreat! This is something I definitely need to work on more. I know it has been an issue for me for a while and have been trying to work on it in practice. This tournament made it clear how much more work I need to do.

In the second period, despite being down 12-6, I was determined to fight hard. But carefully and patiently. I got the first two points, making it 12-8. Still a long way to come back, but better, and I began to feel more confident. But then he got a single light. I only scored one more point, although I can't remember when or how. Once he had 13 to my 8 or 9 I grew less careful, in part thinking my only hope was something dramatic and different. We got into an infighting situation. I should have run past him, or gotten out, but I tried to score infighting. Instead he scored. At 14 to 8 or 9 I had little hope. I fleched and lost to his counterattack. Sigh.

The funny part was how I assumed my DE loss meant I hadn't made my second goal of qualifying for Div 3. It wasn't until the final results were posted that I saw I had. Just barely, I think. So much just barely that I'm still worried there was a mistake somehow and I didn't actually qualify.

THE REST

I stayed and watched the rest of the DEs. Aaron Page had gotten 1st seed. Jameson Lu had only just barely managed to not get cut, at 16th seed. So they fenced each other, and Jameson won, 15-11. I didn't see it, but heard people talking about it—unusual for the bottom seed to beat the top seed and all. Jameson's fencing got better and better over the course of the event. After Aaron he went on to beat Tobias Lee, 15-10, making it to the semifinals where he faced Kyle Margolies. Kyle had beaten me 15-9, but then had a very close bout with Adam Chase. They went 14-14. Kyle got the last point to win. Then Kyle did the same with Jameson, going 14-14 and getting the last point. Sheesh. Kyle and Andrew Lee fenced in the final bout.

In the table of 16 Charlie fenced Tobias and lost 15-13. It was close and Charlie was annoyed after, feeling that he could have, should have won, but made some mistakes and should have known better. In the final 8 Andrew Lee beat Johannes Klein in a very close bout, 15-14. And Shawn Dodge beat Mark Blom in another very close 15-14 bout. Then Shawn and Andrew fenced, and Andrew won by a very comfortable 15-5. Andrew won the final comfortably as well, 15-10.

Kyle and Jameson both earned their D ratings, and Shawn renewed his to 2015.

I took a video of the final:

Ray Coates Memorial Team Tournament, 2015

Well I don't have too much to say about this one. I was on a team with Shawn Dodge and Charlie Muñoz but Shawn hurt his back in the first match and dropped out. Since we didn't have an alternate our team had to drop out too. The other SAS team didn't have an alternate either so, although it is technically against the rules I think, either Charlie or me could join that team. We both wanted to, but Charlie really wanted to, and was fencing better anyway. So that was it for me. I was disappointed but eventually enjoyed helping the other SAS team, watching, offering advice, and so on.

It was the first team tournament I've been to. I really enjoyed the team aspect. I guess there are various ways team tournaments can be run. This one was done in a cool way. There were 11 teams (after mine dropped out) and we were seeded by ratings into a DE tree. If you lost a match you continued in a "loser's bracket" tree until all 11 final ranks had been determined by matches. This meant every team got to fence three or four matches. It also mean that the matches got closer and closer in terms of skill, so that the final matches were usually very close, which made things more exciting for everyone toward the end.

I also took a few videos, four from the SAS and one of the WFA teams, and two from the last match of the day (though not for 1st place—one of the Oregon NWFC had already won 1st).

E and Under Epee at Salle Auriol Seattle

E and Under Epee at Salle Auriol Seattle
March 15, 2015

https://askfred.net/Results/results.php?tournament_id=28372&highlight_competitor_id=91067&event_id=112382

Yesterday at the team tournament Tobias told me to get cracking and post more, that slave-driver! Just kidding, actually you inspired me to finally get to this, Toby. But before getting to the team event I have to catch up with this E and under one:

Yay, an E and under tournament. In this, my third fencing season/year since starting up again, it seems that there have been fewer local tournaments around my level. Maybe there were a few I wasn't able to attend, but the only other similar one was the D and under last December. Otherwise I've been getting battered at ROCs like BladeFest, Columbia International, Leon Auriol Open, and the Battle in Seattle. There was a Thursday evening D and under last week but I couldn't go, and it was small anyway. I came in 3rd at the D and under in December and thought I might do as well or better in this E and under.

Up until a couple of days before the event the list of people signed up hovered around 15. Over 15 and it would be a D1 event, with 1st place getting a D and 2-4 getting an E2015. Less than 15 and it would only be E1, with just 1st place getting an E. So I was hoping it got more than 15 fencers. A couple of days before the event the list jumped to about 22, which made me happy. Including myself there were five Es signed up, of which I was most worried about Trip Atkins, plus the unknown of William Henderson from Spokane.  There were lots of Us, some unfamiliar to me and who knows how good, and others I knew might be challenging. Still, the list looked promising for me.

I checked again the night before and the list had jumped to 26, including Kyle Margolies, who had re-earned his E and was an E2015. I hadn't seen him fence in a while and hoped I'd get to—maybe in the finals, haha. In the past I've beaten him in some pools but not in DEs, so seeing his name made me worry a bit. As it turned out we didn't get to fence, ah well. There were also four or five women signed up, which surprised me a little since there was a women's epee tournament the day before. Maybe some preferred this E and under to the open epee of the women's tournament. I think some, like Krystle, couldn't go on Saturday anyway.

On the morning of the event not everyone who had signed up showed up—Trip didn't, nor Andrew Smith, nor Abby Barr. Jeff Lucas showed up though, which was cool. We ended up with 22 fencers of which five were Es, making a nice D1 event (assuming at least two Es finished in the top eight, and they all did). I, of course, was aiming to come in 1st, like I usually do (although this time it seemed more realistic than usual, when I don't really expect it). If I did I'd earn my D, but at this point I'm probably more eager to come in 1st at all, as I never have in any tournament. But coming in 2-4 would be nice too and would renew my E to 2015.

POOLS

The pools seemed somewhat uneven, but I guess that is to be expected in an E and under. We had four pools—two of six and two of five. I was in one of the pools of five. There were five Es in total, so one pool got two of them, which was my pool (me and Joel Howard). It seems like one of the pools of six should have been the one with two Es, but whatever. I've been doing well against Joel recently, for some reason (perhaps I've gotten used to his various tricks?). It was Jonathan Brace, the older British guy who recently joined SAS, who gave me trouble and beat me. I won my other three pool bouts, two of them 5-1. Brent Farnsworth got a point lead on me but I managed to come back and win 5-4.

My notes are sparse and my memory fading now that it's been a couple weeks, but here's what I got.

My first bout was with Jonathan Brace. We've fenced a couple times in practice and I didn't really know what to expect. I underestimated him though. I thought he would be fairly slow, and in some ways maybe he is, but his hand and arm are fast—faster than I was expecting, and accurate too. He hit my arm as I attacked too many times, winning 5-2.

My notes said 5-3 and after the pool I said I thought the 5-2 written on the sheet was wrong. But Jonathan just shrugged, and Joel (we were self-reffing) said we "have to go with what is on the pool score sheet", which isn't quite true—the whole point of signing off is to say you agree there are no mistakes on it. I didn't push it and signed off on the 5-2 score. I might have been wrong. Plus, this was the third time recently I thought I had scored one point more than the sheet said. Maybe I've gotten in a habit of thinking I did better than I actually did—that seems likely. As it turned out the one point did not make a difference in DE seeding.

Another thing about the bout with Jonathan: I feel that I've tended to have trouble in my first pool bouts recently, especially if I have the very first bout. I seem to need a bout or two to get in the right mindset. Even watching other bouts helps with this, it seems. I'm not sure what to do about this. I could and probably should warm up more. Maybe I should warm up differently, with a more competitive mindset. I tend to focus on warming up physically, without caring much about scoring hits or being hit. I purposefully take it easy warming up, not wanting to overdo it. I think I will try changing this a little—focusing more on the mental and competitive aspect, and if I can, doing warm up bouts with several people over a longer time. Usually I only get a chance to warm up with one or two people. Maybe I should also try to warm up with people I know are better than me, which might force me more into the right mental headspace. Before this tournament I warmed up with Mark Benack who, although he is clearly getting better is still a beginner. At some point I realized I was scoring most of the touches and he was getting frustrated. So I started doing things that made it easier for him to hit me but still being practice for me—like pushing distance a little too close and trying to retreat quickly. He got some touches. I know I was being a little reckless but I think I was still practicing, but who knows, maybe I shouldn't do that kind of thing when warming up just before a tournament.

My second pool bout was with Joel Howard. In the past we've been fairly evenly matched, but lately I've been doing well with him. Yet he sometimes does quite well against people I have trouble with. It feels like his general approach has been falling into my best, or at least my preferred style. In this bout he attacked a lot, in ways I was ready for and able to parry-riposte or counterattack into. I felt like I was triggering attacks by feinting low, or even just extending slightly low with my hand turned over, presenting the top of my hand. This is something I've been doing in practice a lot, with mixed but some good results—half-extending and usually in the low line with a pronated hand, usually with a half-advance or half-lunge, hoping to draw a higher line attack to my hand or something bigger, then rotating to a six and, if catching the blade, finishing with a full lunge or whatever seems right. This was basically what I was trying to do with Joel for the first three points, although not always as cleanly as that description. It felt like it was working as planned, but it's possible he was attacking for other reasons. In any case I was quickly up 3-0. Then we doubled somehow, 4-1. I don't remember the last point, but I think it was similar to the others. I won 5-1.

My third bout was with Brent Farnsworth, a fairly new fencer from WFA. Nice guy, and should get a lot better in short order if he keeps working. Reminds me a little of my own fencing from not that long ago (and still, to some degree): Generally good and doing the right things, but sometimes with overly large blade action which can lead to openings, and sometimes falling for tactical tricks like distance traps or setting up and breaking blade patterns. Still, he got a point up early on. My notes start with me down 2-3, but I can't remember how. I think I tried some dangerous/reckless actions and got nicely counterattacked to the arm. I changed my approach, becoming more defensive, waiting for mistakes and trying to set them up. I can't remember now, but I think I got one point when he made an overly large parry, allowing me to close quickly to the opening line. And I think I got another using Russ's multiple beat thing. Shallow beat and flick to hand, then medium beat, to arm, then, that failing, deeper beat and fleche to body.

So I managed to get two points, but he got one, making the score 4-4. I was feeling pretty confident. I tried a toe touch and got it, but he countered and managed a double, thrown out. Somehow I got the last point to win 5-4. My notes just say "both". I think I meant to say we both attacked and, lucky me, he missed. Not quite sure though.

My last pool bout was with Jeff Lucas. I took the first four points and we doubled to finish, 5-1. My notes are a bit better on this one. First one a low feint to draw, followed with a bind in 8. Second, while exchanging blade action saw his blade go out of line a little too much and lunged to arm. Third, a broken time thing, allowing a straight, if long, attack. I'm not sure about the fourth touch or exactly how we doubled at the end. I wasn't aiming for a double, but he managed it.

So, although I lost one bout I felt pretty good about this pool. Interestingly, Joel and Jonathan were also 3 and 1, losing only one bout. My indicator was +7 while they were both +4, so I took 1st place in the pool. Jonathan took 2nd because his touch-scored vs. touch-received was 18-14 to Joel's 16-12. It looks like it was Joel's 5-1 loss to me vs. Jonathan's 5-3 loss to Joel that did it.

I was 5th seed after the pools. William Henderson and Paul Webster had both lost just one bout, but in larger pools and with higher indicators than mine (+9 and +14). Hans Eyman and Kyle Margolies won all their bouts. Their indicators were +11 and +14.

DIRECT ELIMINATION

Being 5th seed I was in the top half of the DE table. Kyle was 1st seed. I had had an image of us fencing in the final but that wouldn't happen with this seeding. Of course we didn't end up fencing at all, and neither reached the final. Actually, looking at the DE table and having watched it all play out it seems to me the best fencers were mostly in the top half of the table. This might have to do with the ways the pools seemed, by chance, a bit uneven. If my theory here is right one result was that the DEs were slightly easier for people in the lower half of the table—seeds 2, 3, 6, etc—and slightly harder for those in the upper half—seeds 1, 4, 5, etc. Maybe, maybe not. But looking at the table I feel like I'd have had a much better chance to make it to the semis or the final if I had been in the lower half of the table—if I was, say, seed 6 instead of 5. Weird how these things work sometimes.

Anyway, I got a first round bye, then fenced Nathan McKorkle. I had never seen him before. I see now that he's from Spokane—perhaps he and William Henderson came together. Before we fenced Paul Webster told me he had had Nathan in his pool and said he was very aggressive and tended to do one particular thing. He didn't really say what the "one thing" was, but said I should be able to handle him.

Paul was certainly right about the aggressive thing. Nathan attacked frequently, often more or less right off the line or from too far. It felt fairly straightforward to catch him in a parry-riposte, often in 8 or 2 with a sideways riposte jab as he passed. A few times I counterattacked as he came in, to his outside arm, which meant arching my back a little to get the angle. This acted like a bit of evasion, though not quite on purpose, getting his blade to miss on my outside. I racked up points quickly and ended up winning 15-3, and all in one period I think. A few times he backed off his attacks and tried being more defensive. But by the time he started doing that I had a solid lead and plenty of time, so I was happy to wait him out. Jeff and Krystal were watching and cheering me on, which felt quite nice.

After that, in the final 8, I had the 4th seed, William Henderson, the other Spokane guy (Bill, I think he goes by). I didn't know him at all, but got to watch his entire DE with David Pesin. It was pretty close, Bill won 15-13. Watching, I saw a number of things that suggested various tactics. Krystal was watching too and we chatted strategy. We both agreed that Bill might be susceptible to a toe touch, as he often had his weight on his front foot. She suggested I try for one early on, maybe right off the bat, then use the threat of more as a tactic. Other things I took note of: Bill used a lot of hard beats and liked to attack with binds. Sometimes this put his blade a bit out of line and made potential openings. I resolved to look for those shallow openings and also to keep my blade moving actively, to make it harder for him to find my blade to beat and bind. He was young and quick, so I planned to be as quick as I could on my feet, using rapid in and out footwork.

Basically my plan was to start with a foot attack right off the line, but disguised if I could, with a calmer first step or two in—like Matthew Comes used to do before everyone started expecting it. Then, a combination of in and out footwork, lots of feints, threats, and active bladework with the main goal of drawing attacks that would fall short, or which went into a line I was prepared to close out. Also shallow attacks, hand picks if possible.

I think it was a decent plan. Afterward I mentioned the initial foot plan to him and he said it was a good idea, that he is sometimes susceptible to foot touches. But even if it was a decent plan it failed badly. Or perhaps rather, I failed at pulling it off. My initial foot attack was close but fell short. I tried to slip one in a couple other times but didn't get as close. The threat of a foot attack might have still helped me, but it would have been a lot better if I had scored that first one.

My plan for fast in and out footwork was also a good idea that I didn't pull off. I was fast enough going in, but not out. And getting out is the really important part! This is something I've noticed recently—well for a long time but especially recently. I don't retreat fast enough, if I even retreat at all. I'm working on it. Sometimes I want to get into infighting and so stand my ground instead of retreating. My infighting is getting better but still has a long way to go. Practicing it during open fencing makes sense, but I should also be practicing good retreating! Even when I do retreat quickly I often get off balance. Another thing to work on.

As for my plan of using active bladework to make it harder for him to beat and bind, well I'm not sure. During the break Joel suggested I was moving my blade too much, and afterward Krystal said she thought I might have been falling into mimicking what Nathan was doing with his blade. I explained that I had planned to do that and wasn't mimicking. Still, I'm sure that sometimes my blade actions were too big, putting me too far out of line and creating openings. He definitely got a few nice hits on my arm. Afterward I realized I had been doing too much with my wrist and arm and not enough with my fingers. The next day at practice I worked on using my fingers more and felt an immediate difference and improvement. I suspect with Nathan I had way too much tension in my arm and shoulder and was probably squeezing the grip too hard. This also worked against my plan of going for hand picks. I tried a lot, but mostly missed and opened myself up. If my arm and hand were too tense my point control was certainly off.

Sometimes I felt like he fell for one of my feints or traps. Then I'd launch an attack, trying to close him out. Several times I did close him out in this way but still failed to hit before he escaped and hit me. In hindsight I see at least two things that happened in these cases. First, when I did a big attack I often wasn't fully committed. My fleches were slow or awkward (too much front foot, etc), giving him ample time to react. His fast retreats and my slow fleches meant I often failed to pass him and we'd end up infighting. Also, as Joel pointed out, I had a hesitation. I think I was somehow torn between my plan of staying shallow and making a good full attack when the time was right, resulting in that fatal hesitation. Second, and related when it came in infighting, our styles were curiously similar, at least as far as beating and binding went. I felt like this made my own beats and binds less likely to work, as he would "naturally" slip out or do a kind of counter-bind.

Anyway, he beat me pretty badly, 15-6. Then he went on to fence Kyle in the semifinals, and won 15-11. Seeing that I felt better about having lost to him.

In the other half of the DE table Paul Webster did very well. He beat Greg Doss then faced Mark Benack. Mark did quite well, especially given how long he's been fencing, coming in 8th. His first DE was against Krystal in the table of 32 (neither had a bye). Normally I think Krystal would have done quite well, but several things worked against her, not least of which was having her epee fail and using a friend's french grip epee instead. After that Mark beat Jonathan Brace 15-7, which surprised me. I didn't see the bout. Then Mark and Paul fenced in the final 8. I think Mark was pretty excited, thinking if he won he'd earn his E. Paul is a lot taller and Mark's main thing, a flick to the top of the arm, wasn't working. Being taller Paul's arm was higher such that Mark's flick couldn't get over the top of his bell guard. Paul raked up a big lead. Mark kept trying his flick and not much else, and kept getting hit with counters and ripostes. During the period break someone talked to Mark and apparently gave good advice because in the next period he stopped trying his flick and did other things (I was only half watching, thinking Paul had it in the bag, and wanting to see Kyle and Bill fence). Mark managed a decent comeback, getting within two points (from being down by something like six or more). But although his tactics change was good he had a deep hole to climb out of and couldn't quite make it, losing 15-12.

That put Paul in the semifinals and his E, at least, which was cool. He had Hans Eyman in the semi. For some reason I can't remember this bout very clearly, but Paul won, 15-12. So the final bout was Paul and Bill Henderson. Bill's speed, beats and binds worked quite well, and he won comfortably, 15-9. So the guy who took me out in the final 8 went on to win 1st place, fairly easily. I think his hardest bout might have been with David Pesin in the table of 16. David was up at one point, I think, but made a few mistakes near the end. I felt better about losing to Bill. He was definitely the best fencer there that day and deserved getting his D.

In all a good tournament, even if I didn't get to the semis. As a D1 four ratings were given out, of which three mattered: Bill got his D, Paul Webster and Hans Eyman went from U to E2015. Only Kyle's rating didn't change as he was already an E2015. I was going to write a little about reffing too, since I did a bunch in my pool and I've rarely reffed in tournaments. But this post is long already, so, some other time.