RMSG After Action Reports

AAR June 11, 12
Instructor: Ben
Participants: Alan, Kiren, Dan, Jake
Recorded by Jake

Class began with 10 lbs ball toss warm-up. Proceeding to 8 lbs sit ups x40. Moving to sit ups at distance; x40. Next the class performed forward and back roles. Ben worked individually with Kiren on rolls.

Next we drilled I believe Play 6, when both the patient and the agent have a dagger. Subsequently we drilled 2 counters. One when the block moves to the center line; e.g. striking the elbow and continuing the motion of the block. And when the block moves away from the center line; e.g. striking/ controlling the dagger hand closing and at the head or neck.

Following this drill the class moved to longsword. Initially we drilled the Fiori dance. Ben worked with Dan on the basics. And Kiren lead Alan and I in about 10 repetitions of the dance.

Then Kiren and Ben drilled the dagger plays and Alan and I worked on longsword Play 1 and Play 3.

Jake

AAR June 8, 2011
Participants: Ben, Jake
Recorded by Jake

It was a small class in Tuesday; Ben and I. Class began with stretching. Then 10 lbs ball toss- quickly tiring with 2 people. 50 sit-ups.

Class next proceeded to Rotari (Sp?) cuts. We worked through these series of cuts approximately 20 times. Next we went through the longsword plays: Play 1; Play 2; Play 3; Play 4; Play 5.

Ben placed emphasis performing each play with proper technique, particularly in handling the sword and using the pommel as level for quicker cuts. Secondly, emphasis was placed on torquing the hips by placement of the rear foot in play 3. We repeated the drills 1-5. Both together and separately. Then repeated them again.

Finally we did focused sparring. Using a specific 2 plays in a dynamic context; e.g. moving with Ben attacking and me countering with a specific play. We alternated between plays 1-4.

All in all it was great class in which I received a lot of individual attention. Thank you Ben- much appreciated.

Jake

Instructor: Ben
Attendees: Cooper, Kieran, Jake, Alan, Patrick, Dan (new guy)
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Paired sit ups with 8 pound medicine ball x35 close, x35 at distance,
Forward rolls – all sorts, and a review for those that needed it

Class:
We began with the ninth remedy master of dagger. We worked the block for a while. Big points include getting out of range (either by stepping back, or stepping offline to either side), as this is an “oh shit” block. We focused on making sure the thumbs were protected by keeping the wrists inline. Also making the block a really strike. After working the block for a long time we moved on to the forth and fifth scholars of the ninth remedy master. The fourth scholar tells us that he lets you perform the technique of the fifth scholar of the third remedy master of dagger (the ligadura sottano). The forth scholar sets up the lock by pushing the inside of the elbow. The fifth scholar set its up by over grabbing the outside of the elbow and turning it in while pushing forward with the left hand on the agent’s wrist. Both follow by snaking the left hand through to complete the lock. Then striping the dagger.

We closed class with Ben, Jake and Kieran working through more focus sparring. Cooper and Patrick, followed by Ben and Kieran, wrestled.

Instructors: Ben
Attendees: Thayne, Cooper, Jake, Patrick
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Paired sit ups with 8 pound medicine ball x35 close, x35 at distance, x35 at
double distance.

Class:
This was mainly a reprise of last Tuesday’s class (5/24/11)
We started by working a variation of the Rotare of Ben’s devising.
1: Begin in posta di donna.
2: Pass forward and cut mandritto fendente, finishing in dente di zenghiaro.
3: Cut a ribbon cut comprising of a falso riverso sottano (without stepping) followed by a riverso fendente (while passing forward with the left foot) to finish in porta di ferro mezzana
4: Cut a ribbon cut comprising of a falso riverso sottano, followed by a mandritto mezzano (while passing forward with the right foot).
5: Immediately cut back with a falso riverso mezzano, no step, coming to a right posta di donna, but right foot forward.
6: Pass back with the right foot and shoot the point forward into a thrust,
finishing in posta longa, left foot forward.
We ran this for a while, allowing the more advanced (read Thayne and Ben) to really get the speed flowing.

We moved onto to working the Levate. I have included Oscar’s write up from the last AAR.
Levata:
1: Begin in tutta porta di ferro
2: Pass forward and cut sottano into posta di finestra (Oscar and Ben talked
about how this works better if the blade is at more of a 45 degree angle and the
hands are extended forward).
3: Feint a thrust (with perhaps a small acresare with the right foot) and pass
forward with the left and cut riverso sottano into right posta di finestra
4: Pass forward with the right foot and cut mandritto fendente into longa.

After getting everybody up to speed on the cutting drill we set about the paired drill. Things that came up included working with Jacques’ suggestions of rotating the sword in front of the face, though I figured out why this was giving me problems. When the patient thrusts from posta finestra, and is countered by the agent using posta frontale, many of the agents where, instead of pushing up into frontale, where pushing down (to a sort of side posta breve or a point offline plug), this pushed the patient’s point down (setting up a sort of proto hanging perry). To free the point most of us where withdrawing our hands, and taking the blade around behind our head. We worked on making the frontale perry a really solid frontale (high and to the side), which in turn made turning the blade in the correct manner far easier.

Freeplay: Ben worked with Jake on some focus sparring. Keeping the moves limited and running at three quarter speed. Cooper and Patrick played at Mongolian wrestling.

Instructors: Ben
Attendees: Cooper, Patrick
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Sit ups – three people link feet in a triangle, one person has the 10 pound medicine ball.  Everybody does a sit up, the ball is passed to the right, and continue (everybody did 30 sit ups with the ball for a total of 90 sit ups apiece).
x50 squats
Squat, back roll, stand jump and turn 180, squat, back roll, stand jump and turn 180, continue for a while.

Class:
Over dinner on Saturday Oscar talked with Ben and Douglas about a couple of drills that Ben lead us through.  As Patrick has not really gotten any sword time yet, we started with the Rotare, a drill from Greg for covering all of Fiore’s basic attacks (I emailed Oscar for spelling on Rotare, and he sent me this write up).
Rotare:
1:  Begin in posta di donna.
2:  Pass forward and cut mandritto fendente, finishing in dente di zenghiaro.
3:  Without stepping, cut falso riverso sottano.
4:  Let the sword loop right to left and cut riverso fendente, while passing forward with the left foot finishing in porta di ferro mezzana
5:  Without stepping, cut falso mandritto sottano.
6:  Let the sword loop left to right and cut mandritto mezzano, while passing forward with the right foot.
7:  Immediately cut back with a falso riverso sottano, no step, coming to a right posta di donna, but right foot forward.
8:  Pass back with the right foot and shoot the point forward into a thrust, finishing in posta longa, left foot forward.
We drilled this for a while, taking time to address cutting mechanics with Patrick.

We moved on to a second drill from Oscar (again the write up below is his).  This comes from the Iberian montante work of Monte.  Greg has been teaching the montante drills as longsword drills as they work (though we found out that they are a lot harder with a shorter handled sword like the hanwei’s).
Levata:
1:  Begin in tutta porta di ferro
2:  Pass forward and cut sottano into posta di finestra (Oscar and Ben talked about how this works better if the blade is at more of a 45 degree angle and the hands are extended forward).
3:  Feint a thrust (with perhaps a small acresare with the right foot) and pass forward with the left and cut riverso sottano into right posta di finestra
4:  Pass forward with the right foot and cut mandritto fendente into longa.
We worked this as a cutting drill for a while before building a paired drill out of it.  We gradually built up piece by piece, drilling each step to completion before moving on.  The agent began by striking mandritto fendente, which the patient parried using the extended posta di finestra.  The patient then used the thrust to strike the agent in the face.  We discovered that the thrust could also just be a feint, as having a point right in your face is going to make just about anybody react.
After drilling this play for a while we added the next step.  Everything would happen as above, but the agent would perry the thrust using posta frontale.  The patient would then raise his left hand over his right (dropping his point to his right side), pass his sword behind or above his head and cut riverso sottano into right posta di finestra, striking the agent under the jaw at a 45 degree angle.  This is where the longer handle really came into play.  We discovered that the tendency was to helicopter around the head (as the Germans would) and cut mandrito.  Much like how we worked the second play of the novice over the weekend, we found that the sottano sneaks up under the vision very well.
After working this step for a long time we moved to the last step.  Here the agent cut down the patent’s sottano as he would the rompere di punta.  We tried a posta frontale on the right, but the sottano sneaks up under the hands.  We began to discover that, especially if the sottano is used, the agent has only a second to react to the cut changing sides and, left to his own devices, the perry is usually pretty wild.  This works to the patient’s advantage as he basically performs the colpo di villano, cuts around in a mandritto fendente and strike the agent in the head.  When Ben and I really worked it at speed the agent is thrown back on his heels and spends the play reacting to the patient.  Every perry brings the agent’s point offline and unable to reclaim the initiative.  The big point that we did come out with, is that the patient need to commit to every attack.  The riverso sottano, especially, has a tendency just to mark through, becoming more of a hanging perry than an attack.
We ended class by talking with Patrick about where all of this comes from, who Fiore was, how the book is laid out, ect.

Prefect and visiting instructor: Oscar
Instructors: Douglas and Ben
Attendees: Cooper, Kieran, Jake, Alan
Observers: George and Theresa
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Paired sit ups with 8 pound medicine ball x35 close, x35 at distance, x35 at double distance.
x50 squats
x50 pushups

Class:
This was a 4 hour class class led by Douglas and Ben covering the basics of abrazare, daga and spada. Oscar observed, helped us polish those bits that needed polishing, revise those bits that needed it, and showed us where we were just plain off base.

We began class with abrazare. We worked the the remedy master of abrazare. Oscar stepped in and pointed out that the text shows the remedy master applied just above the elbow, as opposed to the just below the shoulder (where we have been performing it). By using the bones on either side of the elbow as a guide, and the soft tissue just above, the remedy master lets a smaller opponent influence a larger. We worked with watching for the shoulder to rotate to see that the lock was complete. We also worked with how to deal with a gambeson, beginning the action by physically grabbing the gambeson at the elbow to begin the turn of the arm. Oscar talked about how the first scholar of the remedy master is truly vicious (if done to completion it breaks the elbow and dislocates the shoulder), and how it is often an artifact of training to do it higher up on the arm to protect our training partners. We worked the first play a little. Working with compass stepping around with the right foot to really apply the lock. We talked some about how the image in the book is not necessarily a snapshot, but an compilation of the critical points in the play. After working both sides we moved on to daga work.

We began with the first remedy master of daga. We worked the remedy master for a while before moving on to a play. Oscar made the point that most everybody does the first remedy master of daga as a palm strike, thus raising the possibility of blowing out the patient’s thumb if he is clumsy. We instead we worked with blocking with the edge of the hand (as you would cut into him with a sword edge), and then turning the hand to grab. We worked the first remedy master mostly with stepping into stuff the action, instead of really voiding to the right. Once we had the block down we moved onto the play of the first remedy master of daga (the circular disarm). After making the block, we grabbed the wrist, brought the agent’s hand to our hip (or along our waist in a circle) to create a disarm (either taking the dagger away or having it fly away). We focused on following up the action with the stolen dagger or with the hammer fist. And par Ben’s note we have been working with returning daggers point first. By the end of the drills people were getting both hands and a good level of speed.

We moved on to the second remedy master of dagger. Again we worked the block for a while before moving onto plays. Notes that Oscar brought up included the second remedy master of dagger is done with the lower forearms crossed, not the wrists. There is still a need to void (to either side) a little with this remedy, as coming straight up the middle to stuff the attack can get you stabbed in the face (or so I have heard). We worked the worked the first scholar of the second remedy master (the figure four ligadua soprana). We worked with shifting the arm away from the body, and stepping through with the right foot to dump the agent.

For the third remedy master of daga, we again spoke about using the knife hand to block instead of using the palm of the hand. After drilling the block for a while we worked the second scholar of the third remedy master (the arm bar). Refrenceing what we talked about with the remedy master of abrazare Oscar showed the elbow manipulation. As we have been experiencing in class lately, the point came up about not over rotating the agent’s wrist as it turns his elbow away from you and sets up a bent arm bar. We ran through a drill that touched on the real need to make the final position of the arm bar a good porta di ferro, with hands at relatively the same height. We had the patient set up the agent in am arm bar, and then had the agent try to squat press out of it to make sure the patient had real control. Keeping the hands level was key, as was bringing the right hand (controlling the wrist) a little higher than the left (controlling the elbow), as you want his arm angled down and not up.

Next we worked the first three plays of the novice longsword curriculum starting with the first (void and counter cut). Oscar watched us work the first play (both left and right handed) and then presented us with an interesting concept. The agent presented normally, while the patient stood in posta di donna la senestra. When the agent attacked with a fendente, the patient (following the core concept of the play: void offline and strike) voided to the left and cut fendente behind the agent’s sword (also known as the sneaky Canadian attack, Bernard mauled me with this at the 600). After playing with this for a while we switched sides, the agent attacking from posta di donna la senestra, and the patient reacting from posta di donna. We worked this play for a long time, making sure everyone was voiding well to each side, before starting at the top but working left handed.

For the the second play of the novice longsword curriculum (void and stop thrust) we worked (as it is written) from posta breve (as opposed to porta di ferro mezana as we normally do). Oscar really stressed how this attack can be used to sneak up under the agent’s vision. We focused on thrusts to the head, throat, or chest, as opposed to trying to thrust under the agent’s arms. Again we worked with voiding left, and against the fendente riverso from posta di donna la senestra.

We worked the third play (falso deflection and cut back down the line) as we normally do. Throughout all of this work Oscar was moving throughout the room offering pointers at everybody’s relative skill level (very helpful), and helping us tweak the techniques to get the most out of them. Oscar really stressed how the agent has to make each technique as clean and “real” as possible so the patient can react correctly.

Finally we set up three stations of unarmed, dagger, and sword and buckler and worked the first three plays of the novice curriculum though each of them. Instead of focusing on the exact movements of the plays, we instead looked at how the concepts of void and counter, void and stop thrust, and deflect and attack the same line could be applied to each scenario. While it was different with each pair, for Ben and myself it looked like this. Wrestling: void (perhaps putting up the left hand to block) and hammer fist. Void and strike from below or palm strike the face. And something that looked a lot like the third remedy master of dagger (using dente di zenghiar as opposed to posta longa) followed by something nasty.
Dagger: void and block the incoming shot (first remedy master of daga) followed by a fendente. Void and low thrust. A hook with the dagger while voiding to the left, followed by something nasty.
Sword and buckler: void (while keeping the buckler up to protect yourself) and fendente. Void and stop thrust. And something that looked a lot like a universal perry followed by an attack back down the same line. The sword and buckler presented an interesting variance as we were forced to attack around the buckler.

Overall a great class that really let us reground. If anybody has notes, thoughts, or stuff that I missed please post it.

Instructor: Douglas
Attendees: Thayne, Cooper, Jake, Patrick
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball moving clockwise and counterclockwise
Paired sit ups with 8 pound medicine ball x35 close, x35 at distance, x35 at double distance.
x50 pushups
x50 squats
The medicine ball running drill with stairs (the drill previously known as the hell drill) – 12 iterations.

Class:
We worked through more of the third master of dagger during this class. We began by going over the first scholar of the third remedy master of dagger (the diving throw). As most of us have worked this play a lot, we were really able to focus on the smaller details of making the play effective, and working with an opponent who was giving more resistance. Big points, as usual, were to use both a spiral and a wave on the the opponent’s chin (breaking his structure in two directions), and using the hips to really power the throw. Also making sure not to bend over (though we seem to be getting better at this one lately).
We moved on to the third scholar of the third remedy master of dagger (the arm bar). We spent a lot of time here working with using the blade of the hand to rotate the elbow. A big note that we found was that if you use the right hand to rotate the wrist too much before going for the elbow it turns into a bent arm bar.
After working the arm bar for a while we shifted into moving from the arm bar into the ligadura sottana. We touched briefly on the fifth scholar of the third remedy master of dagger, but mostly focused on the sixth scholar. We were working what most of us have seen as the canonical version of this play (this is something we need to talk to Oscar about this weekend). From the block of the third master we worked on rotating the dagger arm behind the agent’s back (under the patient’s left arm which is holding the agent’s elbow) followed by snaking in the left arm under both the agent’s and patient’s right arms to complete the lock (remember, in Fiore, the left hand always goes under the right hand). After working with this for a while Jake figured something out that just made us all sort of stand there and go “Duh!”. This is the part we need to talk to Oscar about. If instead of taking the agent’s arm under the patient’s left arm, if the patient keeps his left arm low he can just ratchet the agent’s arm up and over his left arm and directly into the ligadura sottana with out removing either of his hands. One note is that he has to stay close enough that the agent’s dagger binds up on his side (and is pulled out of the agent’s hand) as if there is real distance between the two players the dagger is pointing right at the patient’s chest. We ware not sure what the canonical version of this play is right now, but both are effective and the second flows so beautifully that it is hard to think it is not Fiore’s intended version.

Big note of the day: We have been doing a lot of dagger recently, and people are falling into the drills and forgetting to void offline as their first action. We need to keep in mind the first rule of the game is “Don’t get hit (subtype: getting out of the way)”. For those of you who have not heard it, Rule two is “Don’t get hit (subtype: blocking the other guy’s action)” and rule three is “Don’t get hit (subtype: doing something to him so he cannot continue to try and hit you)”.

Instructor: Ben
Attendees: Tom, Derek, Cooper, Kieran, Jake, Alan
Recorded by Cooper

Warm-up:
Medicine ball throwing with 10 pound ball
Medicine ball throwing with two 8 pound balls going at the same time
Paired sit ups with 8 pound medicine ball x33 close, x33 at distance, x34 at
double distance.
x10 new and different burpee like activity. Ben brought up the point that burpees have the problem of building into our muscle memory dropping forward onto our hands if falling forward (instead of say a front break fall), so he came up with the following drill. From standing: squat, drop into a front break fall, flip over onto your back (hopefully in some form of wrestling guard), do a back roll to a squat, come up and jump. (as usual we used special RMSG burpee counting). This is a cool drill.

Class:
x25 fendente from post di donna la destraza to posta long return to posta di donna la sinestra, cut fendente to posta longa, return to posta di donna la destraza.
x25 ribbon cuts from posta tutta porta di ferro to posta dente di zenghiaro, returning along the same path.
Fiore dance (various people calling the guards).

Having spent the last couple of classes working with the third master of dagger we continued in this vein. We began by taking a good look at how to counter the third remedy master by using the the seventh play of the third master (specifically the first counter master of the third remedy master of dagger). This play works against any iteration of the third remedy master as it counters the initial action. As the patient voids offline and blocks the agent hooks his dagger of over the back of the patient’s hand, shoots his left hand under his right arm and over (and past) his dagger, pulls the hand back hooking his dagger and scissoring the patient’s hand. We paid attention (as usual) to maintaining an upright back and good posture throughout the action. A big point is that the agent needs to keep the dagger parallel to the floor (or twisted a little to the left), for it is possible to untwist by rotating the hands to the right and free the patient. A quick step back after the action helps to get the patient off balance (and from doing anything froggy with his untrapped hand). By the end of the drill we were working with the patient trying to move into one of the plays of the third master, with the agent trying to counter before he himself was thrown.

We moved to another second iteration action, but this time to the patient’s advantage. We first quickly reviewed the third scholar of the third remedy master of dagger (the arm bar). As the patient attempted the arm bar we had the agent strongly resist (tightening the arm and trying to bring his hand to his chest to avoid the arm bar). From here we had the patient shift to the third plat of the fourth remedy master of dagger (a variant on the ligadura soprana). To achieve this patient take his right hand (holding the agent’s right wrist) and pushes it over and to the side of the agent’s right shoulder. Simultaneously the patient runs his thumb and the edge of his left hand across the inside of the agent’s elbow (causing it to bend) before snaking his hand around to grab his right wrist. At this point he should have the ligadura and have locked out the agent’s shoulder, and be prepared to step through with his right leg and dump the agent. The big point that we encountered is that the technique really only works if the patient begins by pushing with his right hand, not by trying to start by cutting with his left. As the agent is already trying to pull away from the arm bar, he works against himself when the patient pushes.

From here we moved into sword work. Today we worked the rompere di punta, the thirteenth and fourteenth scholars of the first remedy master of long sword (zoggo largo) and also the third play of the thrust defenses in novice curriculum. We went over the basic low thrust for the new guys, and how it is used. With Alan I took some time to talk about not watching the opponent’s sword, but instead how to watch his shoulders. With this play we worked a lot with distance. About stepping deep enough to catch the agent’s sword mid blade (thus stopping him from being able to “sowing machine” his thrust and void the remedy), but not so deep as to have to enter grappling (though we talked about how that is an option. Also how the pass back at the end allows you to target the head, arms, or hands depending on how deep it is taken.

Freeplay: Ben and Derek played at longsword while Cooper and Jake played with daggers. Derek (trying to get in as much freeplay as possible before he goes to Florida) then played at dagger with Jake, while Cooper and Kieran went over how to clean up the edges and blade of a sword (sandpaper and a file are your friends, m’kay).

All RMSG members,

Please mark your calendars and plan to attend practice on Saturday, May 21st. We will be holding a special, four-hour class from 1:00 to 5:00pm at Andean’s Health Club with a visiting instructor from the CSG.

We also hope to hold a welcome dinner for RMSG members and friends of the RMSG that evening. Please reply to this posting, both to have a head count of who will be attending class, and to see who can join in afterwards.

Looking forward to seeing you all,

Douglas