BAT Practice

Great practice, though I didn't take much advantage of it. I had taken three weeks off after Crown, and I'm feeling my age a bit all of a sudden.

Jarrod, Bill, Gui, Bodun (a squire from Aethelmarc, great two sword fighter), Daniel (a new fighter), myself, Oscad, and Sir Richard Blackmoore. My real goal was to fight Richard, Gui, and Oscad, but I started out with Bodun. Never start with a good two sword fighter.

I didn't actually throw my best stuff against him, but he is really fast and I wanted to get a good idea of his speed and his calibration, since he's from out of kingdom. His calibration was fine. I had to hit him harder in the legs than I did on the head, but he hit *me* harder in the legs than he did on my head. It certainly wasn't out of line. He was really fast and had a very good defense. He even had that right hand deep wrap block going. I got him with an inside body thrust, a face thrust, and a wrap. I took his leg once and thrust to his body. I found very little of my leg attack was working. He covered it really well.

Next I fought Gui and got exactly what I wanted. Gui is the most impressive pure animal fighter I know. Our first fight I just picked him apart. I did a looping leg shot (start low to the left, bring the sword up between us toward his face, then down into his leg). I was surprised it worked. Then I his my thrusting tip behind my shield and I jumped in the air. When I landed his defense tracked down and I thrust him in the face. Then he got Medieval on my ass, which is what I wanted. He turned into an aggressive fighting machine. The first fight he took my leg then pasted me. He hides behind his shield and comes in for low leg attacks a lot. I was blocking them in typical bunny round fashion, with the top of my shield held low. Our second fight I got a wrap on him, which I almost never do. Our third fight he killed me with a straight shot to the face. Our fourth fight I thrust him in the face, which usually isn't open.

I fought a great set with Oscad. Our last fight was our best. I threw the dropping leg wrap on him and he just watched it come in and hit him. He was shocked. Then we really got into it. After a long set of exchanges I hopped to my right and short sticked him in the face. It was great. All told we split even.

My fights with Richard were what I was looking forward to and they didn't disappoint. He is awesome. He thinks he is slow but he isn't. He is fast and he is aggressive and he has some great moves. And he fights a style I really enjoy, with both an active defense and an active offense. He attacks like a Cuisinart. I can't remember who won our first fight. Our second fight I hit him with the shoulder thrust. Our third fight we took each others legs and rock-and-rolled for a long time, then he killed me with a simple straight off-side face pop. He was peeking out from his shield a bit, so I got him at least once with the cut-from-five saber counter. Our last fight, in which we double-killed, was our best. He took my leg and my shield strap broke (for the second time that day), so I was defending with only my palm strap on my bunny round. I hit him with a high wrap (I think) while he hit me with an onside.

This was, as usual, a great practice. More people should come out and play with us.

today my shoulder, which didn't get hit at all, is quite sore. Like I said, I'm feeling my age. I need to start on those rotator cuff exercises again. By Birka it should be fine. (I hope).