#schermen

Not perfect, but success non the less. As much fun as it is to practise this, it’s good to remember that doing something once doesn’t equal “being able to do it”. You can do something if you are consistent.

We had a pretty tough sabre training but the guys all survived!

At training we did Hysterisch Vrijvechten (Hysterical Freefighting). Basically lots of free sparring with all kinds of weapons. Longswords, sword & buckler, daggers, dussack, dual wielding dussack, sabres, sword and shield, single stick, double stick, rapiers, foam boffers.

The HVN team getting ready for the Helsinki Open! We will have 5 fencers compete in both single stick and longsword and one in the cutting competition. We are also bringing a judge with us.

Thursday training. We are working with the 4 Hangen at the moment. First a warm up, than exercises where a fluent switch between Pflug and Ochs was the main focuspoint. After that we got masks, gloves and a throatprotector for more thrusting. We finished the class with sparring. Everyone in training worked hard.

Yesterday I recieved my new prototype light sparring gloves from St Mark - Fencing Clothes & Equipment and I'm very happy with them. Specially aimed at low gear sparring and I think they will fit great in a rapier. (Maybe it's time I get myself one of those ;) ) The gloves fit very well, they have padding on the hand for accidental hits that give a lot of mobility. Obviously I wouldn't spar woth longswords with these, but that's not what they are made for. When doing drills where the hands aren't a target or sparring only on the head, accidental hits occur. That's what these are for.

As a general rule, I don't fight in the tournaments that I organize. for two reasons. The first is simple, I want to be able to do things as tournament manager. Fixing issues, helping with problems and making sure everything runs as smooth as possible. On the other hand, it feels a bit strange to organize a tournament, get some nice sponsored prizes and than take home those prizes. I had a pretty good chance of winning, I absolutely had to work for it and both Nick, Henric and Daniel gave me great fights, but I was confidend I would place high when entering. I made an exception this year because I felt like I had an extra good reason to join. The charity I choose, The Ronald Mcdonald Huis Leiden, has a reason. Without going into details, two very dear friends of mine are in a situation where they have to use the service provided by the RmcD house and I see how much it is helping them. I wanted to do as much as I can for them and breaking my own rule was the right thing to do. We raised the massive amount of €1200,-! I'm so proud of the whole event and especially the HVN members. I saw great fights, the atmosphere was great, people were happy and overall it was an enormous success!

Swordfish pre-sabre eliminations photo and post-sabre eliminations photo with Bart Jongsma and Ties Kool