It's about precision and timing
"He's powerful, he's fast. But precision beats power and timing beats speed and that's what you saw there... precision beats power and timing beats speed every day of the week" - Conor McGregor
HEMA games
I've spoken about this before but I feel that one of the key pillars of successful swordsmanship is developing a good mental attitude. Being relaxed and adopting a playful mindset allows you apply your knowledge gained from study and drilling to successful sparring. Like with strength or technique there is training you can do to develop this. Training for a good mental attitude is partly about training to reduce stress and reducing the likelihood that you will freeze under pressure. It is also partly about encouraging you to understand the linkages between techniques, how to apply the technique in different situations and how a technique fits into the bigger strategic picture. So, what's a solution? Games. Here's a list of some that I like to use with descriptions (I'll keep updating this list as I come up with new games): Without swords Slappy facey / tag - based on a childhood game from my upbringing in Scotland, slappy facey in it's natural form is...
I have an elder who is not fast nor particularly strong, but he hits me almost at will. When fencing with less advanced students I find I to can hit them with timing alone.
ReplyDeleteI'd agree with the idea that if two people are in the same ball park in terms of speed and strength that precision and timing are very important.
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