The longsword is a powerful piece of historical weaponry. Its mystique has captured our attention for hundreds of years and is consistently prevalent in both ancient texts and today’s pop culture. A typical training longsword is steel, between 40 and 50 inches in total length, and can take up some serious space when you…
This post originally appeared on Duello.TV, Academie Duello's online learning and training blog portal. At our recent Instructor Intensive, the topic of "training so hard that you lose the joy of it" came up. The people who come out to intensives are hard workers. It takes a lot of drive to come out to do…
Training is at least 50% mental and 50% physical. If you’re truly down-and-out sick, then just let yourself be sick. No sense resisting the sleep you need and prolonging the pain. But if you’re just out with the sniffles, or you have an injury that prevents you from physically training, then here are some things you…
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Even if you’re part of a vibrant school or club and have lots of training partners to practice with, keeping a daily rhythm is an essential part of the path of mastery. That means you’re going to have a lot of solo training occasions to fill. Most partner drills don’t effectively translate into a solitary…
Everyone has their own pace of learning. However, there are many strategies that can both help you to make the most of your capacity as well as enable you to learn faster and more effectively. Here are a few useful ideas: Fundamentals First Every advanced technique is made up of fundamental ones. Many students limit their…
Phew! It’s done! It was indeed an intense but satisfying experience teaching Academie Duello’s first formal, week-long instructor training intensive. From October 26th to 30th, thirteen aspiring instructors joined us here in Vancouver for a five-day, 50-hour intensive to kick off their ongoing instructor training program. Attendees hailed from both our local area (British Columbia's Lower Mainland) as well…
Sometimes we have some fun during all the seriousness of swordfighting. Just sometimes. Fun with Fiore This week's video is a Vancouver B Movie Factory episode, "The Flower of Battle", filmed at our riding facility, Red Colt Farm, in Richmond. With Oscar-worthy performances by students Michael Molnar, Ben Davis, Chris Richardson and Mounted Combat Program…
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Welcome to the first Historical European Martial Arts Video blog post on the Academie Duello blog! Our new weekly Monday post will feature awesome video content from our school and the broader community. Look forward to sparring videos, performances, great educational content, and more. This Week In Sparring To kick things off with a bang we're…
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Day Five I have a confession to make. I was neither able to attend Class 5 nor was I able to take advantage of the evening classes to make up for it. What’s a sword-fighting student to do? Thankfully, my trusty blade-wielding comrades filled me in on the general content for the class, and, wonderfully,…
I have pledged to do better this week. I am inspired by my latest Cornwell book, as well as by the lovely bottle of mead I was presented with by one of my shield mates. He offered it in exchange for a promise that I would not overly bludgeon him during our training. Day Three…
Greetings everyone! It's the second week of October and the tracks of awesome swordplay continue, though one of them is only a slightly different course than last week. Greg and I posted up videos for Rapier Cutting for Green Cord (level 1) but as many of you let us know, that was completely incorrect.…
Greetings everyone, This week I am in Chicago preparing for the Western Martial Arts Workshop in Racine, Wisconsin. This is a superb Western Martial Arts event put on by the Chicago Swordplay Guild and is one of the oldest running events of its kind in the world. This week in our classes…
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…
Classes are cooking along at Academie Duello this week. One thing I have been excited about in Vancouver is the increasing number of women in our programs. We have always had a good ratio of men and women but in last night's Green Cord portion of class we had 12 students and only 2 of…
Hello Everyone, This has got to be one of my favourite weeks in our Mastery program curriculum but I'm a complete subtleties geek and I love the rapier -- a weapon that is all about subtleties. In Green Cord (level 1) we're using the cut to stringere the opponent's weapon (perhaps the least subtle…
Welcome to the first full week of August. Our Blue Cord and Red Cord curriculum works on a 9 month rotation and we're back to month 1. In both our calendars this is a month on fundamental rapier. For Reds (level 3) we're working on plays in various tempos and how to counter them. For…
Welcome to Duello.TV for the week of June 3rd. The sun in shining in Vancouver and its a great time to train outside. I know that many Academie Duello students are getting into some extra time at the sword as they participate in the 30 for 30 Swordplay Challenge. If you haven't joined, it's not…
Welcome to Duello.TV's videos for the week of May 27th! This week 'practice' has been on my mind. Capo Ferro says that swordplay is made up of Nature, Reason, Art, and Practice. Practice being the disciplining of the body to enact the principles of art, that have been identified through reason, and governed by the…