Poleaxed

When you train as hard as I have trained for this crown you get beat up. Today was the last day of training. I got Poleaxed. It was awesome: but I think I'm going to take it easy for the month of May.

REHAB
I have been using rubber bands and Indian clubs. They are working. My elbow feels great. So does my shoulder, the only thing to hurt it lately was a class I took in flyfishing. Dangerous sport flyfishing.

WORKOUTS
As with last week my workouts hit a snag. What I thought were allergies turned into a wicked Springtime cold. Workout since last Sunday have been very light. Just a couple of days of yoga push-ups and bicycle riding. This coming week of course I won't be working out much at all: you need to rest before Crown.

BEAU GESTE!
I scheduled this month's Beau Geste as a warm-up for Crown and in that sense it was great. Because we were starting at 11 and it was just before Crown there were only three fighters present: myself, Anton, and Tycho. I set it up as a round robin in sets of three. We each had to fight the other two with sword and shield three fights: then two weapon, then poleax. That meant 18 fights for each of us. This is about the number it would take to win Crown, and would give us some practice with multiple weapon forms. An added bonus for me was that they are both lefties.

As usual it took me a while to get my focus. I beat Tycho in our first sword and shield fight but lost the other two. My mind was all over the place. I kept thinking about footwork, distance, and what I should do next, instead of thinking about the fights. By the time I fought Anton however, my mind was good. I kept my feet in line, cut him off when he tried to move, and use my distance well.

In the two weapon fight, Tycho took sword and ax well I fought with sword and dagger. I found that my usual technique against that style did not work against a lefty. I won one fight with a frost, and the other after taking his acts arm. He killed me with a short punch to the face with his ax blade. Even though I won the fight, using sword and dagger was just a mistake. With that in mind, I took two arming swords against Anton. That was fun! Using the Bellatrix style, I took his arm and took his leg then hit him in the body. Using the Milwaukee style was a failure. He got me with a short punch to the face. In our third fight, I mixed it up and presented my points and I got them with a body thrust.

That left great ax, a form that I love but don't always fight that well. Against Tycho I did well and two of three. Anton however is a pole arm fighter. He killed me all three fights. The last one was such a good hard blow I almost did not want to get back up off the ground. We got into a bind with his axhead above mine. He stepped back and swung for the fences almost pick axing. It was epic. The round Robin ended with 10 victories for Anton nine for me, and eight for Tycho. Very even, very fun.

Gui dictated that the last fight would be daggers which he put 20 paces away and forced us to run to at the drop of a flag. I was not about to play that game. I walked, and let Anton grab the dagger and do what ever he was willing to do. After some thought he picked up the other dagger and handed it to me and we fought. I love dagger fights. I'm pretty good at it and so is he. The fact that he is a lefty messed me up a bit. I held my knife with the point up and was doing very well. I almost got him under the arm. But when I switched my knife to a dagger grip, with the point down, the fight was really his. I thought that might be the way it would go, but I wanted to mix it up. Fighting dagger against a lefty is a bit odd. He stabbed me right in the throat. What a fun fight!

I am done training for crown. More on that later. I have worked my ass off and gotten beaten up in the process. I have loved every minute of it.

It is six days until Crown tournament, and that is the next time I will be in armor.