The War of the Roses, a large three-weapon tournament with team and individual events, was held in Beaverton, OR on June 26th and 27th. I competed in Open Epée on Sunday the 27th, an A2 event with 35 fencers signed up. 30 actually did show up.
I had a whale of a time.
Most of my first pool bout, vs. Emily, was something of a game of chicken, with both blades almost completely still, both of us trying to give off as little information about ourselves as possible throughout the bout. At least for those three minutes, her favorite actions were riposte to the shoulder from circular 6 parry (she’s a rightie, I’m a leftie) and picking to the underside of the forearm whenever I got too close.
Being somewhat paranoid about risks (even more than the average épéeist, and even in pools) I simply played the game of chicken, waited for the opportune moment (for her to get my ideal lunge distance), and used my all-time favorite action against righties: graze attack to the outside line. At least, that was my intention; we had one mini train-wreck that ended in some desperate infighting. When both fencers do nothing but remise like their lives depend on it, oftentimes they might as well be throwing dice. This time, the dice fell in my favor. The bout ended 5-2, my victory.
My second bout was against Cory, a NCAA fencer who does foil as well as épée. This bout was a slow one; Cory fights very defensively, constantly parrying in the air with circular and semi-circular motions and hardly ever attacking. For the last few months, I had been relying too much on waiting for my opponent to make mistakes that I could take advantage of (instead of creating the opportunity myself) with the result that I was thrown off by someone who fences the same way. Cory scored the first touch, followed by a double, at which point I came to my senses and asked the ref for the amount of time remaining. I’m really glad I did, it was 3 seconds. I had no choice but to CHARGE.
Charge I did, taking the blade with a low-line bind that hit something–somehow–before time ran out. My opponent adamantly claimed that I hit the floor, the ref maintained that she hadn’t seen anything hit the floor and couldn’t be sure, and I still have no idea what I hit. Luckily, the ref gave me the benefit of the doubt, flipped the coin, gave Cory the priority, and we went into overtime with the score 2-2.
I learned something important here. Although Cory, having won the coin flip, would win the bout if I failed to score a touch during our 1 minute of overtime, she was afraid. So when I started trying to intimidate her, probing a bit more deeply than usual with my point and pushing her down the strip, she appeared to want to get it over with quickly before I got too desperate and aggressive. Which meant that, for the first time in the bout, she would attack. Unfortunately for her, that was what I had been wanting her to do for the last 3 minutes, and I scored the last touch on a riposte to her flank. She was mad.
My third bout was against Archie, a V-60 fencer with one trick that I had tried and tried to beat last time and simply couldn’t–an attack on the blade with a fleche. I had always had trouble fencing him. So this time, I fenced with my arm down, where he couldn’t get at my blade, and defended myself with distance. He still got me on a few fleches, but I didn’t feel completely helpless, having used a few genius tricks of my own (now if I could only remember what they were!). My last touch was scored on a direct attack when he seemed to thinking too much of attacking and not of defense. The bout ended, 5-4, my win. Whew.
My next bout was against Maria, a very crafty V-40 fencer. It was a tricky bout. Her favorite action (at least that I had seen) was a short-distance fleche, usually with a beat. Unfortunately, I was a bit dim and didn’t realize that she was looking for a very specific distance, one that was just too close for me to react in time, so I kept coming forward with glorious dreams of attacking and hitting and would instead see her light turn on as she ran past me. Maria won, 5-2.
My last bout, the final one in the pool, was against Richard from Salle Trois Armes. He was a lefty. I used my best action the entire time–graze attack to his inside line–and won 5-0.
The wait between pools and direct eliminations was most pleasantly short, and before I knew it, every fencer was crowding around the window where the DE brackets had been taped up. I was still eating Oreos a ways away while chatting with my mom, and when a teammate walked by and told us, “You two are fencing each other, and the winner gets either me or Kris” I basically wilted. Out of 30 fencers I could have drawn for the first DE, it had to be my MOM.
While waiting for our bout, we sat together and watched the bout between our teammate (Jared) and Kris, which would decide whom the winner of our bout would face in the round of 16. It was an interesting bout, with both fencers seeming to play a very tempo-based game. Jared won 15-11.
Soon enough it was time for the Mother vs. Daughter bout. I noticed with vague amusement that it was reffed by a good friend of mine who fences foil and sabre (with a deep-seated horror of épée). Noticing Jared sitting at the end of the strip, presumably with the intention of analyzing how his possible opponents were fencing today, I was resolved to show as little about my fencing as possible and use no unnecessary movements. Having been beaten by my mom in practice a few times in the last two months, I was resolved to make her do all the work this time: I would wait and wait and wait for her to make all the mistakes. Yes, I was going to try to out-patience someone over 40.
It was arduous. After the first period, the score was 1-1. I had barely even moved my blade during those whole three minutes, and she had barely attacked. How we avoided getting yellow-carded for non-combativity is a mystery. During the 1-minute break, I closed my eyes and told myself that she’s just another fencer, just another opponent.
Most of the second period was the same, with the score staying close. During the second 1-minute break, I knelt on the metal strip, which closely resembled a 14-meter cheese-grater, and simply tried to calm myself down. I had forgotten to bring a water bottle with me to the strip, but wasn’t suffering any ill consequences as far as I could tell. After I felt like a minute had passed, I stood up and noticed that our ref was lying on the floor, with the appearance of being asleep. Ignoring decorum, I prodded him in the stomach until he stood up, looking groggy and slightly annoyed.
My mom and I fought the third period in earnest. I felt screams ripping from my lips with every sudden movement, and my mom attempted to make a points run (which I was just barely able to check). In the final minute, we took turns going on the offense according to who was leading, and the time ran out at 10-9, my victory.
During my ten-minute rest between that bout and my next bout with Jared, I attempted to eat, but my nervous stomach only accepted the food reluctantly. I gave up and tried to think about what I would do against Jared.
Our bout started slowly. For the first minute of the bout, we pushed and pulled each other up and down the strip. I was watching for mistakes, I don’t know what he was doing. Eventually, he chased me to my end of the strip, there was a parry-riposte phrase, he kept it up one tempo longer than I did, and scored the first touch. As we walked back to the guard lines, I told myself to “wake up, idiot” and soon enough, the score was 3-1, my lead.
Eventually, it was time for the 1-minute break. I stood with my eyes closed, told myself that I had never seen him before, that we had never practiced together or fenced for the same high school team before and that I didn’t care about beating him any more than I cared about beating anyone else in this tournament. This is a problem I have to deal with whenever I compete against someone with whom I train every day.
The second period was an angry one. Jared alternated between charging at me with a flying lunge, and fencing at a normal pace, but kept pushing me down the strip either way. There was lots of screaming from both sides, there were several corps-a-corps calls, and at one point, during some rather desperate infighting, Jared sprinted past me, twisted around behind me, and ended up on the floor with the reel-cord wrapped around his neck.
I was a bit conflicted as to whether I should let him push me back (as I’ve had very good results from bracing myself against the end-line before) or whether I should go on the attack, but after some mixed and not especially felicitous results from using the former option too much, I took my chances with the latter. If nothing else, it bought me time and prevented him from charging (the score was still very close).
At the second break, I knelt on the cheese-grater strip again, gulped some water and just zoned out, not wanting to think about anything.
A minute into the third period. The score was 14-13, my lead. He was going to charge. I wanted to counterattack and perhaps win with a double, but no, he hit the side of my mask before my ill-timed counterattack could get anywhere near him. 14-14. He came forward aggressively, and I had no clue what I was doing–I randomly stuck my point in his direction as he tried to take my blade, and somehow, miraculously, my light came on. 15-14, my win. I’m still surprised I didn’t faint.
My last bout, in the round of 8, was against Ryan, a nice kid from NWFC. I ate some more, calmed myself down, and sat with my back against a locker and tried to think. I had pulled a muscle in my hip during the third period of my last bout. I didn’t want to injure myself so close to Nationals (my first event is on July 5), but I would not be happy if caution cost me a victory.
The first period was a bit disheartening. I was trying my best to conceal any information about my fencing (keeping my blade as still as possible) while soaking up any patterns I saw in his, but Ryan, like many fencers from his club, had a good fleche and was really picking up points on it whenever I got too close. By the time he had gained a 4-1 lead, I was, to say the least, frustrated. It seemed a few attacks were in order, and I ended up bringing the score to 4-4 on attacks to the arm and flank, but I simply couldn’t do anything about that dang fleche, no matter how many times I told myself not to let him get close enough (he was looking for a very specific distance).
After the first break, which I had spent trying to think of ways to defeat the fleche, I went on offense again. Apparently, if I timed my direct attacks right, after pushing him a ways down the strip, he would not be prepared for them. Unfortunately, you usually need more than one trick in your bag to win a bout, and that one trick was all I had. I hit him twice on a riposte during his fleche, but it was definitely not something I could use consistently. He hit me on infighting once.
At 11-11, the one consistent trick in my bag wore out. I suppose I should have realized that if I used a direct attack over and over again, he would eventually start parrying, which is what he did. I should also have made the effort to find a new trick to counter his solution for my old trick (i.e. second-intention or a compound attack), but my brain had apparently run out of batteries, and the bout ended 15-11, Ryan’s win. I was out of the tournament, finishing 6th overall.
My mom finished 26th, and my 2 sallemates, Jared and Adam, finished 12th and 15th, respectively. And so ended a good day of stabbing, killing and roses.
