Share experiences! Cross-discipline sparring

[Benjamin Smith]

Whenever I spar with anyone I've just met I go over with them what counts and what doesn't. You have to agree with your opponent before a sparring match can be productive. If they come from another discipline you have to make doubly sure that they understand that the rules are different in this case and for ARMA it usually means that people can't ignore blows that they could ignore in other systems. You have to bring up issues and examples of situations like: "If I hit your hand/fingers/leg before your blow lands it's not going to count because you would lose control of your weapon" the point is to make it abundantly clear what you consider valid before and what they must consider valid in the context of the match. This works best when there are other people watching, people tend to behave better when there are other people who can attest to the evidence.

In my experience if the issue is just ego, don't even bother. It will just lead to an argument or resentment later.

[Michael Navas]

"If I hit your hand/fingers/leg before your blow lands it's not going to count because you would lose control of your weapon"

If you'll all excuse my derailment for a moment, is this true according to historical sources?

If someone is doing a zorn to your head, and you cut off their hand or leg while they are doing it, obviously the cut will be disrupted, but it's still a sharp bit of steel, edge aimed at your head, coming a high speeds against it. It may be less deadly, but still deadly enough, surely?

How could countercuts that didn't also obstruct the enemy weapon be effective? Did it demand voiding of some sort?

[Sal Bertucci]

One thing I learned in a recent test cutting exercise was the importance of precise edge alignment. I threw the same cut twice. The first time my edge was off, and while it did cut the damage was minimal. (I'd like to say I did it on purpose as an example but...um...yeah) I cut again and focused more on the cut, and had a solid deep cut that would easily be lethal/debilitating. That's with both my hands and feet. Also if a hand is lost on a longsword (or any weapon for that matter) the sudden destabilization of that weapon will screw up the shot. Especially considering that you are most likely going to distribute some of the force to the weapon.

Traversing while you step is an important part of fighting as well.

[Jason Taylor]

"If I hit your hand/fingers/leg before your blow lands it's not going to count because you would lose control of your weapon"

If you'll all excuse my derailment for a moment, is this true according to historical sources?

If someone is doing a zorn to your head, and you cut off their hand or leg while they are doing it, obviously the cut will be disrupted, but it's still a sharp bit of steel, edge aimed at your head, coming a high speeds against it. It may be less deadly, but still deadly enough, surely?

How could countercuts that didn't also obstruct the enemy weapon be effective? Did it demand voiding of some sort?

I think it also depends on what the timing is. If you wait for the shot to be halfway there, then we usually call that a double kill. If you hit the hands while he's advancing in a thrust that doesn't land on anything, and then he redoubles (to use a fencing term), then that's likely a blow that wouldn't have gotten started. With my experience, there was a little of both, and I'm only really complaining about the latter. Of course, some of the cuts were cocked and then he throew them anyway.

[Benjamin Smith]

In order to do serious damage a weapon has to be aligned properly, have enough time to cut, enough force to cut, and be placed properly. Disrupt any of those elements and the damage will be superficial, or greatly decreased. If the fingers of a hand holding a sword get seriously struck by a sharp weapon of any kind it will be almost impossible to maintain all of those elements in the strike. If it hits just a little flat it could save your life. Try test cutting something with someone parrying the blow in the middle of the stroke and you'll get an idea.

Besides most people's bodies have a lock up reaction when there is a serious injury, especially a bone penetrating one, and a blow to the fingers will hit bone. This tends to disrupt things too.

This is one of the big problems you have to deal with sparring. We don't get a realistic effect of the injuries. It doesn't take much damage to a hand to disrupt a blow. Sure it's possible to get a double-kill, but in a situation like this, say zwerchau v. zornhau, zwerch hits the hands on the zorn's way in, I'd be inclined to think that the zornhau wouldn't do anything significant. Even a slice to the hands could seriously screw it up.

[Stacy Clifford]

If the blow is too far advanced to avoid landing when it's disrupted by a hand hit, the sword will still retain its projectile force as if you had thrown it because the mass is still moving forward. What you lose is the counterforce against the elastic rebound and friction caused by penetrating a resisting object, so even with perfect alignment it will only dig in as far as its mass and velocity dictate, and you have no ability to continue applying force after impact to counter that lost by friction. I agree with everybody though that once you lose control of the weapon maintaining edge alignment is nearly impossible and will significantly reduce the amount of damage you can do.

[Chris Ouellet]

I'm iffy on this one guys. It depends how the blow lands and on which hand. The primary sword arm can continue a swing if the secondary is not functional, one handed primary arm cuts can clearly do a lot of damage.

There is definitely some logic and history to the kendo system of making the right kote target and the left not. They make the distinction that the left is target when held in a raised stance.
I just wish I could find the actual history to it...

It's one of those things that in a real situation you would have only one chance to test if it were not true. I wouldn't personally bet my life on it. Sharp steel coming down with speed is still sharp steel coming down with speed and I'm an unlucky guy.

[Ken Dietiker]

Here's how I see it: if you go for a cut to the hands while your opponent is performing a down ward cut at your head and you are still standing in the path of his blade, you deserve to be cut, disrupted or not. I don't think it matters if the blade will still cut you even if the path or force is disrupted. Either move out of the way, or don't cut at his hands, cut at his blade instead. Or am I missing something here?

[Stacy Clifford]

Usually when I hit someone in the hands it's not because I was aiming at them, they just got in the way of the real target (unless they just left them out there where I couldn't miss). Happens all the time. Chris has a point though, it does depend on which hand gets hit as to how badly your control of the sword is altered. I assumed we were talking about the forward hand.

[Jason Taylor]

Here's how I see it: if you go for a cut to the hands while your opponent is performing a down ward cut at your head and you are still standing in the path of his blade, you deserve to be cut, disrupted or not. I don't think it matters if the blade will still cut you even if the path or force is disrupted. Either move out of the way, or don't cut at his hands, cut at his blade instead. Or am I missing something here?

Well, really I'm more talking about the redoublement thing. I.e., he strikes, misses or is blocked, and I cut his hand (solidly). He then proceeds to initiate a new strike to hit me in the head.

In some cases, there was double-hit contact, but we never call the first hit the only one in our study group. Instead, we assume that if it's not clear, then it's a double kill and we both lose. So I'm fairly used to recognizing when someone's already on their way in and not trying to defend by cutting his hands in that moment. NOT that I never do it by accident, mind you....

Jason

[Shane Smith]

Usually when I hit someone in the hands it's not because I was aiming at them, they just got in the way of the real target (unless they just left them out there where I couldn't miss). Happens all the time. Chris has a point though, it does depend on which hand gets hit as to how badly your control of the sword is altered. I assumed we were talking about the forward hand.

If I land on the inside of the forearms, it's often on purpose. As a tall guy with a long reach, it is not in my interest to allow someone to close very much. Everytime their sword comes my way, a little void and a downward cut almost assures their forearms are in grave danger. Now, if I do hit the hands of a training partner, that is generally an accident. I do not target the hands themselves on purpose...but sometimes my forearm shot falls short as you say and it's then that I get the hands.

Hands are too delicate to go after with much vigor if gloves aren't being worn in my experience.

[Stacy Clifford]

True, I'm really targeting the wrist or forearm, not the hands, on those this-is-too-convenient shots, and not unless they're wearing gloves. Those long arms can work against you too though, they're a lot easier to reach than the rest of you.

[Chris Ouellet]

Ok guys, resurrecting a dead thread here because 4 months ago we actually did do the cross-disciplinary sparring I alluded to earlier in my posts. I only just recently got the videos and have since uploaded them to youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vQQLwhi ... re=channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skGxcsm6 ... re=channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzo6iNNn ... re=channel

They're both very shaky to start, and Ben uses a lot of 1-handed strikes which are a definitely a part of Gumdo but over-emphasized here because he clearly wants the reach. Overall both had to adapt, it was a lot of fun for both involved.

As an aside if the announcer (me) looks like he's hobbling and off-balance it's because in fact I'm in very bad shape. My ACL is torn in my left leg from a martial arts competition and my neck is sprained from bad travel and sleeping conditions.

Rob has some additional fencer friends who are interested in doing this again on a larger scale, it would be sometime next summer (when I'm fully recovered post-surgery) and if there are any amongst you who are interested in participating just PM me. No pressure to perform, we're a friendly bunch, it's fun to see how these things play out.

[Andrew F Ulrich]

Hi Chris! Thanks for sharing the videos. It's certainly interesting to see people of other disciplines going at it. I agree at the beginning the movements are pretty cautious, and was glad to see the fencer start to lunge more around the second part.

I thought I heard you say something at the beginning, after shouting to begin the match for the first time, something that sounded like "straight line rule, straight line rule"... Did I hear that correctly? Was a rule imposed that required both to stay on a straight line? I also don't know much about kumdo, so could you tell me is there a similar rule in their competitions?

Also, does the kumdo guy practice with bokken (i.e. mokgum, right?) and live blades as well in his training, or mostly just shinai? I ask because a couple times it didn't seem like much care was taken to keep the "blade's" edge aligned. Just reading the wikipedia article on Haedong Kumdo, it sounds like they're starting to advance to mokgum in the higher level competitions. Just a suggestion, but I would love to see him use one next time if he has one and feels up to it. I'm also wondering if any of the interested fencers for next time might be interested in trying sabre.

Again, thanks, and I look forward to seeing more. I hope you don't mind my suggestions.

[Chris Ouellet]

Hey Andrew!

I absolutely don't mind suggestions, criticism or praise, by all means.
Absolutely there were edge alignment mistakes, however I assure you than Ben can without a doubt cut with proper alignment, I'll post a target cutting video shortly. We do our best to discount improper hits.

To answer your questions: Initially we're using olympic fencing rules, so when I shout "straight line" it's because Ben is naturally drifting from a linear approach, and in olympic fencing there's a very limited piste for lateral movement.

Kumdo and gumdo are romanizations of essentially the same word, "gum" = sword, "do"= way. "Haidong"= east coast.
In practical terms all korean martial arts are a total mess of rivalries, fishy historical roots, schisms. So if you say Kumdo it can mean different things to different people.
In general:
Kumdo = Korean kendo, practiced almost exclusively with shinai and bogu using the exact same rules as Japanese kendo. The largest federation freely competes in Japanese tournaments, shiai (and generally perform quite well). Several groups still contest the origin of Kumdo as being Korean, rather than a relic of Japanese occupation and these people often refer to themselves as "Gumdo".
Haidong Gumdo= Korean sword art, practiced almost exclusively using real sword and wooden sword (mok-gum). Few practitioners spar. However the basic training can be (very) rigorous and you often will find people with a very good cut in their ranks. It depends a lot on the instructor, and the world federation has tried to popularize it by accepting many poor instructors into their ranks (notably from TKD with minimal training).
Historically the system is cobbled together from an old text, the Muye Dobo Tonji but mostly it is modern interpretation of Japanese Kenjutsu. There are 2 main branches resulting from a schism, style is distinguished primarily by one branch having a lot more kicking in it (much of which is frankly silly).
So it's a mess, you rarely know what you're getting. The style I and my students do is closest to world federation haidong gumdo.

As for sparing with mok-gum, we can't without real armor, it's simply far too dangerous and deadly to use at anything approaching the real speed of our cuts. We will spare with anything safe, shinai is our preferred because it's cheap and readily available. As it is, even with shinai we can't use full power and full technique, it's too dangerous and damaging.

Hopefully we can get a saber fencer or someone from WMA for our next venture!