On Wednesday we had a thoroughly packed class in Godalming as 14 new people started the introduction to swordplay course. Simon also gave a lesson in spadone and Kasten taught a class on rapier & dagger. We had a brilliant time, everyone was very enthusiastic and eager to learn, and we look forward to watching our new candidati progress in the school.
We had a great turnout for freeplay in Godalming on Sunday, where people practiced with sword & buckler, rapier & dagger and smallsword. The next freeplay session will be on the 29 April in Reading. Freeplay is included in monthly subscription and is open to studenti and above.
Senior Sots instructors Fran and Lizzie held this event for its second year in Godalming on 17 & 18 March. It was attended by over forty women – several Sots members among them – and all the classes were led by female instructors, including Emilia Skirmuntt who has taught as a guest instructor in Reading (and will soon be teaching rapier again in Godalming) and Maria Makarova: also from the School. Other instructors were Steph West from 1595 Club and TerryAnn Towers St Amand, who led the warm up and cooldown. There were classes in Fiore Longsword grapples, Saviolo Sidesword and Italian rapier.
The second day started with a Q&A panel with the instructors, chaired by Fran, followed by a novice tournament using boffers, and a steel tournament. In each competition there were randomly chosen but paired weapons.
Next year’s event is already in the can, with ten instructors and speakers! Watch this space.
The inaugural English Sidesword Open took place in Godalming on the 24 and 25 February. We had so much fun running it and taking part that plans are already in afoot for ESO2019: it’s going to be even bigger and better!
The event consisted of workshops and tournaments: we were honoured to have guest instructors in the form of Devis Carli and Pietro Bruzzi from Sala d’Arme di Achille Marozzo in Italy, Rob Runacres from Renaissance Sword Club UK, Aaron Coode from KDF Bournemouth UK, and Chris Chatfield from 1595 Club Brighton UK.
There were six tournaments in all, a nylon and a steel stream in single Sidesword, sidesword and dagger and Sidesword and Rotella. Thanks to a dedicated army of volunteers largely made up of Sots members, we were well staffed and everything ran on time. We saw some beautiful fencing throughout the weekend.
Students from both Godalming and Reading turned out on Sunday morning for the latest in our regular sparring sessions. These provide an excellent opportunity for students to get some practical experience of using methods they learn in our training sessions.
There was a good mix of single rapier, rapier & dagger, and sword & buckler fights taking place over a fun, intense two hours.
A number of School of the Sword students took part in the Untournament on Sunday.
Designed as a practise session for judges ahead of the Astolat HEMA open, it gave participants the opportunity to practise their skills with longsword, sword & buckler, or rapier & dagger against one another under tournament conditions.
All our students, from seasoned tournament fighters to those in their first competition, did the school proud with a number of students making the semi-finals in the Rapier & Dagger and Sword & Buckler competition.
Against skilled competition from across the UK, Piermarco Terminiello took first place in both the Rapier & Dagger, and Sword & Buckler competitions, whilst Stewart Hotston took third place in Sword & Buckler.
Our Godalming students came together on Wednesday night for our regular training session with three streams of training on offer.
Adrian worked with the beginners approaching their safety tests, Lizzie worked with the Bolognese group and Pim continued his work on the single rapier.
Paul is the latest of our students to pass his safety test and join the ranks of our Studenti.
In order to pass the safety test students must demonstrate control, efficacy and knowledge of the cuts and guards of bolognese swordplay.
Paul will now be able to progress to taking part in many of our other training streams as well as full sparring.
We had a great turnout in Reading for our Sunday Sparring session today. There was a great mix of weapons being played with: everything from rapier & dagger through to spear and rotella. There was also a nice level of feedback from students as well, analysing their fights and point out areas of possible improvement.
We celebrated a very hectic, sweaty session with a trip to the pub and a nice carvery.
Another busy night in Godalming on Wednesday where the school offered three streams of training.
Fran worked with the beginners working towards their safety test. Adrian took the Bolognese group through defence with the buckler and Pim worked on feints with the single rapier.
