How's your horse sense? Be sure to demonstrate safety and common sense when working around 1000 lb animals by correcting these common errors.
Remember Your Students' Names: Three Tips
At Academie Duello we care both about the process of developing great students but also of creating great teachers. To that end I like to periodically share articles about the process of teaching and learning to teach. Dale Carnegie, in his influential How to Win Friends and Influence People, says "the sweetest sound to anyone…
East Meets West in our Mounted Combat Program
At the end of July through beginning of August we had another set of students go through our Mounted Combat Intensive. As always, we held a playday on the last day, but this year we decided to open it up to other riders. Along with some of our regular participants, we were delighted to be…
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After Fundamentals - Approaching the Green Cord Curriculum
Chances are, if you’re a member of Academie Duello, you started your path to mastery the same way I did: choosing a fundamentals class, learning the basic concepts of your chosen discipline, earning your green cord, and receiving your Academie Duello black binder upon conclusion of the course. Then comes the next step: transitioning from…
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A Language for Fighting
Language is what makes memorization possible. Memorization is what makes analysis and improvement possible. Technical jargon can seem like a burden when you're first learning a martial art. European martial arts in particular have dozens of guard names, positions, attack types, and terms for movements of the sword and body. It can be daunting when…
Summer Fun at Cornwall Ridge
Summer's in full swing here at Cornwall Ridge, and there are plenty of opportunities to swing a sword and ride horse with us. Start with the Mounted Combat Arts Intensive coming up in a week's time, join us for a playday on August 4th, and get back into the saddle with weekly adult classes or week-long kids' camps.
Which Sword Though?
If you’re anything like me, then the reason you walked through the door at Duello was probably because you peered through a window one day with childlike wonder, fascinated at the scene before you. Rows of people, faces expressing the same glee I felt, all swinging swords at each other. I remember feeling, with absolute…
Lord Baltimore's Challenge Event Report 2019
At the beginning of July I had the pleasure of once again being a Ring Director, Judge, and Instructor at Lord Baltimore's Challenge in Washington, DC. This event aims to be a meeting of Historical European Martial Arts practitioners from HEMA clubs and from historical re-enactment backgrounds (primarily the Society for Creative Anachronism). The focus…
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Overcoming Negativity
Hello there! My name's Dan, I'm a green cord student of 9 months at Academie Duello. I've been offered the opportunity of creating content for the school's blog for the foreseeable future, focusing on bringing you updates on all things sword related. This week, we look at overcoming one of the most formidable opponents out…
Webinar: From Drill to Skill
This past week I hosted a free online webinar about how to take a technique learned in class and make it something that is actually an internalized skill. This is a process that is well understood in sport science but very under-practiced within HEMA. The norm in many clubs and study groups is simply to…
Growing Mounted Combat Close to Home
If you don't live in the BC Lower Mainland, here are three ways you can still learn Mounted Combat with Academie Duello.
A Stable Situation: needs and habits of the horse
Horsemanship Level 1: Stabling Aside from food, which was covered in last week’s post, a horse needs shelter and security. These topics are both covered in the linked blog posts. For the Horsemanship 1 test we ask about Stabling: needs and habits of the horse Along with reference to food, secure fencing, and shelter, we…
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What’s on the Menu? Feeding Your Horse
Horsemanship Level 1: Basic Feeding First of all, go and re-read this post on my own blog, which covers basic feeding. There is an entire science to equine nutrition, but for Horsemanship level 1 test we ask specifically about: Basic feeding: succulents, grain, roughage & water And here are the short answers we’re looking for.…