Greetings everyone to the first fine week of September.
This past weekend many Academie Duello members as well as friends from abroad including Paul Wagner of the
Stoccata School of Defence in Australia and Samantha Swords from New Zealand joined in the annual Cascadia North Accolade Tournament. This year the event took place on the beautiful Newcastle Island, which is near Nanaimo, British Columbia. You can read a report of the event and see some pics no the Academie Duello blog
here.
This week, Greg and I will be getting back to shooting new Duello.TV videos. I'm looking forward to getting in a couple hours on Thursday to lay down some new content. We fortunately shoot enough in a go that we've still had new content to post all summer but we've made our way through most of our backlog. Look forward to new and refreshed material of all sorts in the coming months.
This being the start of a new month we're onto new subjects at each level in our master program and in our longsword focus program. Look forward to videos on "Receiving" with the rapier (level 1), Sidesword fundamentals (level 2), and Longsword fundamentals (level 3). Also look forward to in-depth videos on the use of Porta di Ferro and Dente Al Cinghiara from our Longsword Focus classes.
I hope you still have summer weather where you are -- unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere!
Longsword Focus
http://duello.tv/featured-videos/this-week-in-class/
Porta di Ferro is an excellent guard for receiving attacks from an opponent. It is restful and leaves your response to attack simple and easy to execute by virtue of all attacks having to come above it. This weeks class focuses on the fundamental attacks and movements from this superb waiting guard.
Green Cord (Level 1)
http://duello.tv/featured-videos/this-week-in-class/
Two months ago Greg and I reshot the videos fro the receiving month to reflect a new way of doing things at Academie Duello. Be sure to follow this months videos closely to enjoy a new presentation on the strategy of allowing your opponent to come to you. This week we look first at mechanics of movement then at the 5 measures and how to judge and exploit them.
Blue Cord (Level 2)
http://duello.tv/featured-videos/this-week-in-class/
In this week of classes we are focusing on powerful cutting mechanics with a single handed sword. We will explore how to properly connect the large muscles of our body to the swing of our weapon while maintaining the proper order of operations that sends the sword first across the distance to our opponent.
Red Cord (Level 3)
http://duello.tv/featured-videos/this-week-in-class/
The sword in two hands is a powerful tool for cutting and defending against cuts. In this week of class we look at the fundamentals of making powerful, mechanically and tactically sound cuts as well as how to cross those cuts at various distances and with various blade relationships.
Devon Boorman is the Co-Founder and Director of Academie Duello Centre for Swordplay, which has been active in Vancouver, Canada since 2004. Devon’s expertise centres on the Italian swordplay tradition including the arts of the Renaissance Italian rapier, sidesword, and longsword, as well as knife and unarmed techniques.