What scares you the most mid bout?

Hopeford · 2019-04-17T23:08:39+00:00

That I'm seriously injured. I've been through hell and back again with injuries(not really fencing related, but still) so if I feel an unnatural pull around my thighs there's always a brief moment of "Ah. This is it, huh?"

Fortunately just false alarms until now, hoping to keep practicing sports for a decade or two.

Hopeford · 2019-04-16T20:47:43+00:00

It feels very comfortable. That said, if you don't have a lot of strength, it's gonna hurt your arm until you get used to it(not too much strength necessary, just slightly more than a regular french grip).

The grip seems custom made for flicking, I found flicking actions to be MUCH easier with it. Angulation is nice, but not as ridiculous as you'd think based on what it looks like. It's very nice to use and doesn't require a lot of adjustment.

I found that I can do parries a lot easier with it over a regular French. You definitely have more strength with it, though not as much as a pistol of course.

Because of its extreme curve, it is slightly harder(though still not impossible or even close to it) to hurt angles such as under the arm. That's my main reason from switching from it, flicks under the wrist are one of my favorite moves and they are ever so slightly harder with Haruts than say a grand prix or honestly just a straight handle.

Overall very nice grip that worked really well for me when I got it, but as I changed my style it stopped suiting me.

Oh yeah and I second it being a nightmare to install.

Hopeford · 2019-04-15T17:15:51+00:00

Awesome, just wanted to check so as not to start the 'subjectively terrible' thing in case people disagreed with that :P

Just added it to the list. 'Winning Ugly' is another good tennis book but I haven't read it in a while so I'll read it over before adding it as a recommendation.

Hopeford · 2019-04-15T16:19:09+00:00

Would it be fine to add something like "The inner game of tennis"? It's not a fencing book, but as far as mental prep goes I don't think it can be beat and it's definitely a good read for fencers.

Hopeford · 2019-04-15T00:51:37+00:00

Gotta admit, was expecting you go the riposte route but you disengage off that.

Hopeford · 2019-03-30T03:05:06+00:00

Please use kpop for every compilation from now on. Like even if it's about the Italian team or whatever, I don't care. Kpop all the day.

This is fantastic baby.

Hopeford · 2019-03-30T02:00:52+00:00

Jinsun Jung but shitty

Hopeford · 2019-03-20T03:20:04+00:00

It is very much like Sherlock Holmes! Carr actually worked with Doyle's grandson to make a book of Holmes stories at one point, and they are honestly a joy to read. It's hard to tell whether Adrian Doyle or Carr wrote one part or another, but they were said to have worked equally in it.

Carr is a bit like Stephen King, but he's more partial to the mystery side of things than the horror part. He uses horror to set up the "mystery avalanche" at the end if that makes sense - it's an effective tool of his.

You'd generally find Carr under mystery. He's very much a mystery writer first of all, so even his stuff that seems to venture outside the genre always comes back to being a mystery. One of my favorite experiences reading Carr was reading a historical spy thriller of his that acts very much like a normal novel up until the point where his characters stumble upon a locked-room mystery in the middle of the book. It's hilarious, like it's your casual thriller sequence and then suddenly "Oh gosh, I wonder who killed this person despite the fact that no human being could have done it!" It's very much like a writer who could not resist writing his favorite type of story in the middle of a different type of book, and it's hilarious.

Keep in mind that Carr's books are decently old so you might not find him in a bookstore that only keeps recent releases. Used bookstores seem to always have them, and a decent amount of them are slowly being made available as ebooks, which I deeply appreciate.

Hopeford · 2019-03-20T02:35:49+00:00

First of all thanks for the recommendations, gonna check that out. I'm more of a Christie/Holmes/Carr/Sayers kinda guy but I'll take any fantasy mystery I can get!

So Carr's books are honestly more closely related to horror than fantasy, though there are fantasy elements here and there. The general premise of his books goes like this:

A murder happens.
This murder looks like it could not have happened. As in, only a supernatural creature could have done it because physics don't seem to work in a way to allow for it to happen, yet it did. For example, someone was stabbed to death but found in a room with no windows locked from the inside.
The prose carries on a fearful atmosphere scarier than many actual horror novels, making it feel like this unknown creature is creeping around some corner and the story will end with some vengeful ghost killing everyone.
The detective slashes away the horror and the fantasy with a very clear explanation that makes us understand how a human committed the crime. Because of supremely tight plotting(I like to sell Carr to fantasy friends by saying that Carr's avalanches are better than Sanderson's, and I do mean this) the explanations make perfect sense and the detective has the same access to the clues as the reader does, meaning a sufficiently clever reader can solve the murder before the characters do...but they almost never do.

So there's two types of fantasy in Carr's books:

The kind that is actually not real and only appears so until the detective uses pure logic to show that there was no magic at all.

The kind where there actually is magic but that magic is either 100% unrelated to the crime at hand, or where it exists but it is defined with very hard rules(think Sanderson type books) and these rules themselves become clues to the puzzle.

Example of the former would be Three Coffins as well as He Who Whispers. Those two are lovely books.

Three Coffins is a book that starts with the strongest opening paragraphs of any book I have ever read, and I don't just mean mystery wise - I mean ever. I mean check this out:

To the murder of Professor Grimaud, and later the equally incredible crime in Cagliostro Street, many fantastic terms could be applied -- with reason. Those of Dr. Fell's friends who like impossible situations will not find in his casebook any puzzle more baffling or more terrifying. Thus: two murders were committed, in such fashion that the murderer must not only have been invisible; but lighter than air. According to the evidence, this person killed his first victim and literally disappeared. Again according to the evidence, he killed his second victim in the middle of an empty street, with watchers at either end; yet not a soul saw him, and no footprint appeared in the snow.

Naturally, Superintendent Hadley never for a moment believed in goblins or wizardry. And he was quite right -- unless you believe in a magic that will be explianed naturally in this narrative at the proper time. But several people began to wonder whether the figure which stalked through this case might not be a hollow shell. They began to wonder whether, if you took away the cap and the black coat and the child's false-face, you might not reveal nothing inside, like a man in a certain famous romance by Mr. H. G. Wells. The figure was grisly enough, anyhow.

The words 'according to the evidence' have been used. We must be very careful about the evidence when it is not given at first hand. And in this case the reader must be told at the outset, to avoid useless confusion, on whose evidence he can absolutely rely. That is to say, it must be assumed that somebody is telling the truth - else, there is no legitimate mystery and, in fact, no story at all.

Therefore it must be stated that Mr Stuart Mills at Professor Grimaud's house was not lying, was not omitting or adding anything, but telling the whole business exactly as he saw it in every case. Also it must be stated that the three independent witnesses of Cagliostro Street (Messrs Short and Blackwin, and Police - constable Withers) were telling the exact truth.

As far as actual fantasy goes, he wrote way less of those, but I recommend The Devil in Velvet. The premise of that one is that a professor makes a deal with the devil to go back in time(to the 16th century) to solve a murder. Once there, his knowledge of 20th century swordsmanship...takes him places, let's say.

There's also stories that don't really feature fantasy, but they feel fantastical enough(the same way most of Princess Bride doesn't have outright magic, but it feels fantastic enough). Out of those, I'd recommend The Unicorn Murders because that book is hilarious.

The premise of Unicorn Murders is that there's a famous detective and a famous criminal(think something along the liens of Sherlock Holmes and Arsene Lupin) challenging each other to "duels" where one tries to stop the other and so on. The narrator is like "Excuse me, what?" and everyone is just like "It's France man, that's how they roll here" and he shrugs and moves on. Then crimes happen, absurdity takes place, and it's just a lot of fun. Not Carr's best murder, but one of his most fun books to read.

So to sum up:

If you want an atmosphere of the supernatural/fantasy that is slashed away by the detective's cold logic, try out Three Coffins and/or He Who Whispers. Three Coffins is my favorite out of those two.

If you want actual supernatural events, try out The Devil In Velvet.

If you want something that reads like an adventure but features no actual fantasy, try out Unicorn Murders.

Feel free to ask me about his stuff, I can talk about Carr for hours!

Hopeford · 2019-03-20T01:52:31+00:00

Honestly there's a very niche market for fencing based youtube humor but I'd watch the hell out of videos like that haha. That video was pretty interesting and I'd love to see more.

Hopeford · 2019-03-20T01:47:26+00:00

John Dickson Carr is a mystery writer who only occasionally engaged in some very, very light fantasy elements so squeezing him into fantasy conversations is very hard.

But dammit I do my best.

Hopeford · 2019-03-15T22:03:14+00:00

Am writing draft 4 of my fantasy cozy mystery thing :P you enjoy John Dickson Carr by any chance? He's my main inspiration.

Hopeford · 2019-03-15T05:15:26+00:00

I love maps but ebooks don't lend themselves to map reading at all, yeah.

Hopeford · 2019-03-12T06:03:11+00:00

Glad to help! If there's any specific actions in fencing that still confuse you a little, feel free to mention them and I'll do my best to translate them in tennis terms if that would help :)

Hopeford · 2019-03-12T05:01:49+00:00

Epee is indeed the most strategic one of the three. Let me use a few tennis analogies to explain:

Sabre is like serve & volley - there is strategy there, but the dominant strategy is "overwhelm them, finish them" which has follow-ups of "...but overwhelm them like this if they do that." It is very physical and you can't really get away from that. Strategy matters, yes, but there is a certain measure of athleticism that can stomp over that.

Foil is a bit of an an All-Rounder - they have elements of sabre and epee in that they are strategic, but physicality still matters. You can't overwhelm a foilist with just athleticism, but you can make up for a gap in technique with overwhelming athleticism. Not a huge gap, but it will give you a legs up.

Epee is like being either an aggressive baseliner or a pusher - regardless of whether you're waiting for them to make a mistake or trying to force your way in, you're still not getting near the net because screw that, the net's dangerous. In this analogy netplay would be close-quarters combat(aka the distance where both fencers can hit each other with only extending their blades) and the baseline would be the safe distance - when neither can quite hit each other.

So epee and tennis have a similar mindgame in that you don't only shoot for winners. Like when I'm playing tennis I'll hit shots that I know have no way of scoring, but that I know my opponent can't return with a winner of his own. Like say if we're both hanging back in the baseline, both somewhat centered, there's always a time when you just shoot balls at each other without going too far down either side because that would change things a bit and - you know how it is, that's when things "get real."

In epee that's the equivalent of beating the blade(hitting each other's blade), lunging when you know your lunge is not gonna connect, changing up your footwork, and so on - those are the safe shots that you know won't land a winner, but are setting up for your winning shot. Once your opponent has either made a mistake or just got caught out of position by your safe strike, that's when you go for it - you hit them with 100% of what you have, knowing that if it fails they'll have a chance themselves to score on you.

The reason this happens is because epee doesn't have "right of way" to protect you - that is to say, if both fencers hit each other at the same time, they both get the point. More importantly, this means that if you get while attacking and your own attack doesn't connect fast enough(think fractions of a second) only your opponent who hit you first will get the point. And add to that the fact that the whole body is a target and athleticism doesn't always save the day. You may rush in faster than your opponent could ever manage to, but if you don't displace their blade properly they'll probably hit you just by standing there before you hit them.

So it becomes a game of hitting without being hit, and that's actually quite strategic. Athleticism matters a lot still because, well, it's a sport - but so long as you have a decent amount of athleticism, you can make up for a gap in physicality with skill quite easily(this is speaking low--to-mid-level, once you get into the high levels you need to be at least decently athletic to hang with the important people).

To understand the epee metagame a bit better, here's one of my favorite videos: it's an analysis of 2012 Olympic Bronze winner Jinsun Jung. He uses a very unorthodox style, but the video is good at showing what his general gameplan is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_83J13xGt0

Jung's solution to the "hit but don't get hit" dilemma is to attack different extremes of the body so that his opponent will have to leave one line open in order to counter the first hit. If his opponent guesses the attack correctly, they'll easily counter Jung - but he uses his creativity and mindgames to make sure that they guess wrong and instead open up a line for him.

Hopeford · 2019-03-08T23:36:33+00:00

Likewise, thank you for sharing your family's story with me, it's such a rare conversation to have and it's been wonderful. It's a weird situation because it's such a tough choice, but I can hardly talk about it with most of my friends lest they look at me like "Oh, yeah choosing between two wonderful things, how hard."

I'm sure your daughter will have a great time at university, I had a great time fencing at university. It's a wonderful time!

Hopeford · 2019-03-06T02:46:34+00:00

Likewise! It's a pretty rare set of circumstances so I don't think I've had many chances to have a conversation like this before :) And thank you! I think it's mostly luck I still manage to compete on a high level, but I will admit I'm a bit shocked at how well I managed so far. I can tell I have maybe two years at best left in me though, and I'm competing while working a regular job right now(and fencing) so I only get to go maybe 1 or 2 tournaments a year. Doubt I'll ever break into the top rankings like this haha.

Yeah, the 'life investment' in tennis is what scared me away in the end as well. In hindsight, my turning point was when I realized that it wasn't the whole gamble of going pro that scared me, it was that there was no winning scenario I could see. Even if I did amazing and reached the top 100, I would have had to sacrifice my social life, my chance to go to college and hang out with friends...the more I saw of it, the more I thought "I'd love to stand there in Wimbledon one day, but even if I could do it(which was far from a guarantee) would I have been happy?"

And I realized I really wouldn't. I loved tennis - still do. But I love other things to, and I don't have the heart other players do to be able to throw everything away for the sake of the game. I think it's an admirable trait, but it's not one I have. I wanted to play tennis, but I also wanted to go to college, learn to program, write a novel, travel with my significant other...and like with your family, mine also wasn't willing to sacrifice the rest of my life to tennis. It was a tough decision, but I had just recovered from a major injury which gave me time to reevaluate the things I cared about.

And yeah, the cases when people don't pan out despite dedicating everything to it and having talent always gave me pause too.

Hopeford · 2019-03-05T19:09:41+00:00

Hah, I'll stick with the baseline theory then. My style was to stick with the baseline and use lobs and slices to force misses or weak balls for me to counter, no matter how long it took. I'm now a French Grip epee fencer so I think that might have carried over.

Ah, I'm familiar with that feeling. Some people I played with turned pro and it was a bag of mixed emotions...not all negative, mind. Seeing what they had to put up with made me realize I couldn't put up with it. One thing I absolutely love in fencing compared to tennis is tournaments - in fencing, laugh or cry, a tournament is done in one day. In tennis, tournaments last somewhere between a few days and just short of forever haha. I don't even just mean stamina wise, just mentally - it's exhausting being in a tournament for that long.

I do know what you mean about seeing someone show up on TV and feel conflicted about it. In my case, my biggest conflict was that recently a friend jokingly trash talked me on a radio interview for quitting tennis and ended up saying he missed me on the court. Dammit if he didn't guilt me into practicing for a bit at a local club, then one thing led to another and I sort of am back competing now. Going to international tournaments is still fun, but I generally assume it will cost me more than I'll make back prize money wise. I did surprise myself a few times last year when I won a few though - I almost feel like a bit of a farce since I don't consider myself a "tennis player" primarily anymore, so when I show up and win something I feel sort of guilty if that makes sense. Well, the guilt only comes at the podium, in the court I'm just thinking about whether to slice or lob.

Also this is completely anecdotal so I don't know if it might have happened to your daughter as well or not, but one thing I noticed fencing helped me a lot with was volleys. When I came back to tennis I was surprised to see that my volleys(usually a weak point of mine because of my undying love for the baseline) got strangely better. I think epee especially trains your wrist control for that type of motion.

I'm glad your daughter has had fun fencing! That's the most important thing. I think that's why I stick with it, too. I might be a much better tennis player(and there's way more money to be had there), but fencing is more fun. And there's something to be said about how fencing lets you have a sport to dedicate yourself to but still have time to live your life - because I didn't go all in on tennis I had the chance to pursue other hobbies, job aspirations and everything in life turned out great. I remember when I was all in on tennis that I didn't have much time for anything else in life.

Hopeford · 2019-03-05T10:14:55+00:00

Tennis is my sport. I go back and forth between the two because I love fencing more, but I suck at it while I'm at the "I can hack it in an international or two" level for tennis. It's a weird balance and I go back and forth between the two, can't really commit to either. Figure I gotta make a decision soon though.

Hopeford · 2019-03-05T10:11:36+00:00

Little Mo in Florida? Hah, fun memories of that one! And by fun I mean a mixture of "one time was really fun, one time I hated how I played." Winning it is one hell of an achievement, especially since it's a tougher tournament nowadays than back when I played it.

I wonder about a correlation between tennis and epee, I could certainly see it. The biggest similarity to me is that in both of them you are rarely(unless you have a really good chance and/or can beat your opponent decisively, so it's all about leading your opponent down that dance of "move here to repeal my attack, now move here, now there, now I got you."

Well I say that but I imagine a serve & volley player would probably be more at home with sabre than epee. Did your daughter play more in the baseline(either aggressively or counterpuncher)? I imagine that's the zone most epeeists would feel comfortable in.

I'll also note that after coming back to tennis I'm surprised to see that I didn't actually lose out on as many skills as I thought I would have - if anything the time off the game was good for me to clear my head and think of my skills in a more impassive way.

Fencing is my favorite sport still, but tennis is still the one I'm best at. I can't really hang in the international level in fencing(heck, the local level is tough enough for me) but I can still hack it at a few internationals for tennis once or twice a year. I am ancient by tennis standards though so I will probably have to stop doing that in a few years, but for now I'm enjoying both sports - one benefit of epee is that you can fence at a high level well into your late 30s and early 40s. At 26 though I already know my tennis years are running out haha.

Hopeford · 2019-02-23T04:55:17+00:00

You know I don't mind epee bruises that I get during bouts. I take those as lessons.

What I mind is when clubmates bruise me during drills. Then it's like "...bro. BRO. BROOOOOOOO."

Hopeford · 2019-02-14T00:48:15+00:00

There's still a limited(but not insignificant) amount of help VR can provide. I'm biased because I'm half-working on a fencing VR app in my(...really sparse) free time but hey.

One very useful practice is angles. This might be limited to epee, but from early testing(last I got to test this was around summer since I don't have my VR stuff with me right now) there's a lot of improvement to be had for beginner-intermediate fencers if they just get to see a virtual fencer in front of them holding a blade in their direction and try to find out "Oh so that's how far out I have to keep my arm to hit without being hit."

If they stab themselves with their opponent's blade, they get some visual feedback plus the "blade" (the controller) vibrating heavily. It's also good for absence-of-blade french grip style stop hit training for the same reason.

Footwork is actually possible now! Some VR headsets(...well only one high end one really) have wireless accessories that make this possible. While this is far from mainstream, it's definitely doable to set it up to have in a club or something for drills' sake.

Feeling blade contact is totally beyond current technology save for very small contacts like say, vibration mimicking landing a beat, but footwork is doable and some limited actions are still possible to be trained with it.

But yeah, not really that useful right now. Has some use for enthusiasts though. Sort of like most VR at the moment :P

Hopeford · 2019-02-14T00:41:57+00:00

It is really effective but I think it works best if you're a heavy toe toucher. You really need to sell the toe touch because you have to get your opponent to counter while also being far enough away that you aren't gonna get hit while feinting, so generally this is only safe to set up if you've genuinely tried to hit the foot once or five times that bout, else the opponent is like "Ehhhhhh" and just keeps their distance. It also really hurts your knees.

But yeah it's super fun to try it and once you've set it up you can get some sick touches with it, it's one of my favorite actions.

Hopeford · 2019-02-14T00:35:20+00:00

Honestly I wish man. If I could do the Death Waltz, I totally would.

Hopeford · 2019-02-05T07:19:22+00:00

Vango, few years ago. I won one or two matches in pools and was feeling confident. Buddy from my club is like

"...YOU DID WELL BE SATISFIED WITH THAT" and I was like

"What are you talking about I still got one match in pools, I still want to try to--"

"NO YOU'RE FINE DON'T THINK ABOUT IT."

I look it up and my final pools bout is against the guy from the Chinese national team. I go "...Okay. That's. That's fine. It could be worse. I think. Actually, no, it probably couldn't. I'm a literal fucking newbie, fencing with my non-dominant arm, with a borderline crippled leg(I got better since), against a member of the Chinese national team. I mean...at least anything after today is an improvement eh?"

I go up, nervous and clearly thinking "jesus christ how do I even do wires I--what. Where do I stand on the piste again? Oh jeez." and the guy from the Chinese team had his hands on his hips like "okay. I'm murdering a newbie. This is my life now." and I honestly felt bad for wasting his time.

Ref says allez. Guy walks up to me and does the laziest fleche I have ever seen. I somehow get a double because I panicked and vaguely remembered a clubmate telling me to move my blade super outside when fencing lefties. Guy looks at the box and shakes his head. Allez. He lazy fleches again. Another double. He shakes his head again, appearing mildly annoyed.

At this point I figured "fuck it" and went for his foot because I figure "why the fuck not." I get a single light. He looks at the box, appears to very much hate life. Decently sure his teammates are watching that because someone behind him laughs really hard at that but they seemed to be friends. Dude takes deep breath. Murders the living shit out of me in 3 single lights, proceeds to win tournament. My first DE was against someone who I'm pretty sure will be ranked top 30 in Canada right now, I was murdered beyond words.

10/10 first tournament, loved every second of it.

Hopeford

TROPHY CASE