Mind tuning

I fenced in the Norfolk Senior County Championships today, and I came across a very great challenge whilst I was fencing. In the poules, I fenced someone who I know doesn't have very good technique. To my annoyance, he beat me 5-3, due to the fact that he would constantly run forwards, twisting deliberately and lunging low to avoid being hit. What annoyed me was his victory due to bad fencing, not his victory itself. In the DE, I came up against him, and beforehand, I took a few moments to try and work out how to beat him.

It is a strange thing, and perhaps a hard thing, to change a style of fencing instantly. It needs to be gradual, and sometimes forced. For instance, I was told by one of my fencing instructors to keep my elbow tucked in and turn the wrist over more so that the thumb is at '1:30'. I struggled with this for a few weeks, and then tried to change back to my original form of outward elbow, thumb on top. I was amazed to find that I could not remember how I used to do it. So, was it possible to change my entire style to beat this person?

I don't suppose I changed the whole style. More or less, I just changed my form, and my attacks. Rather than my usual arsenal, I tried a more patient approach. I had nine minutes, so why try to end it in one? After the first period, the score was 3-2 to me. After that, we were never more than one point ahead of each other. Eventually, it was 9-8 to him. I desperately wanted to rush in and finish this, but this little niggling thought kept screaming NO NO NO NO NO NO!. So, I tried to keep calm (by the way Dave, C.U.P, calm under pressure is hard, but good). I scored the next two hits, and I knew then that something had changed in my opponent. Rather than his slow and steady movements, he had speeded up, and his non-fencing arm was rigid with tension. Something had possibly twigged in his brain, that he could lose this, and in my opinion, he abandoned what had been working without knowing it. He began to attack me more often having previously scored on the counter-attack. When he shouted at the referee, who had just awarded me the hit for scoring with a blatant parry riposte compared to his fleche, I knew that he was getting wound up. I won the 15-11, and ended up coming joint third overall.

The point of this blog is to show that everyone has what I like to call 'A Punishment Mind'. This is where the fencer gets into the mindset that if they get angry, they will ferociously beat down their opponent in a flurry. This may work for some people, but the calm way is almost always the best. Aggression is better than anger, and in this case, it proves itself.