Godalming Sparring – 23rd December 2023
Today saw our Godalming students had their final freeplay session of the year. There was a great turnout with a great array of disciplines on display.
Today saw our Godalming students had their final freeplay session of the year. There was a great turnout with a great array of disciplines on display.
It was the final training session of the year for our Swindon students and we had a tournament. Students not only competed but judged as well, gaining an appreciation for how difficult it is. Congratulations to Jonathan for winning the tournament and well done to all fencers for the quality of fencing on display.
It was the final training of the year last night, and in Godalming we celebrated with our traditional “Fight before Christmas” – a freeplay session of randomly selected weapons. We had partisans, poleaxes, flails, maces, all manner of sword of course, and even a pillow!
Our Godalming students met up today to practise a little free sparring with a number of different weapons. These sessions allow students to practise and refine techniques in class as well as give valuable experience of sparring with a multitude of different opponents.
It was free sparring night at Swindon tonight, where students got the chance to spar with a number of different weapons including daggers, rapiers, and smallswords. Students also got to play with Montantes, longswords and polearms in what was a fun filled but exhausting evening.
Our Oxford students had a rare occasion to meet up today without any weapons as they enjoyed a Xmas meal together at a local pub. It’s been a fantastic year for the chapter filled with great fencing, tournaments and swords, and they are very much looking forward to welcoming new beginners in 2024.
Swindon students were treated to a special night, where they voted which concepts we’ve covered this autumn they wanted to revisit. They chose to look at second intention and the sidestep. They revisited old concepts, plus covered the areas in more depth. We also had a welcome half-time break with the strawberries Valentina brought for us.
Some of our Godalming students met up today to enjoy some outdoors sparring. These sparring get-togethers provide the perfect opportunity to practise techniques learned in class as well as get experience of fighting against opponents they might otherwise not get regular practise against.