Conventional wisdom among fencers and fencing coaches often holds that the way to win fencing tournaments is to win more bouts, and that the way to win more bouts is to score more hits. At first glance, this seems obvious. However, it is far from the whole story, or even the most important part of the story.
A fencing match is a combination of at least 12 factors, including:
1. Technical preparation: mastery of a sufficient set of skills that the fencer can remember and apply in combat and that can provide a sufficient range of offensive, defensive and counter-offensive options.
2. Training: the development of the skill set to a level where reactions are quick and execution is instinctive, fast and precise.
3. Tactical Development: The development of the ability to change tactics during a match, adapt tactics to the opponent’s actions and the referee’s calls, and impose one’s own tactical logic on the opponent.
4. Psychological preparation: a complex task that involves preparing the athlete’s mind in a general sense, as well as giving the athlete specific tools to face the psychological challenges of competition.
5. Referee Preparation – Shooters must be prepared to analyze the performance of referees and adjust tactics to the way a referee handles the match. With this, the fencer must be able to apply psychological techniques to manage the impact of the referee in the match.
6. Conditioning: physical preparation, including both general fitness and sport-specific fitness, performed according to an annual training plan and integrated with technical, training, tactical and psychological preparation and competition selection .
7. Competition selection: Since fencing competitions are weekly events, those competitions that logically fit into the overall goals of the season require preparation that may or may not include other competitions.
8. Opponent Scouting – Each fenced opponent must contribute to a database of information about potential opponents in future tournaments, including everything from the fencer’s fighting hand to an analysis of their tactics.
9. Effective bout planning: A fencer who enters a bout without a plan is not planning to win; victory becomes a matter of luck. The fencer must have a plan for the match and be able to execute that plan.
10. Nutrition: Proper nutrition (and also hydration) is vital not only as part of general preparation and training, but also to give the fencer the energy needed for specific events.
11. Equipment Preparation: Fencing equipment must be in excellent condition and the fencer must carry more than the minimum. This eliminates not only equipment failure cards, but also the stress of having to fix weapons between fights.
12. Knowledge of the rules: A staggering number of shooters, and at least some referees, are unaware of the rules of the sport and do not know how they are applied. Shooters must study the rules and know them intimately if they want to defend their interests against incorrect or capricious decisions.
Fencing is a very specific sport that uses unique movement patterns and requires rapid movement and great efficiency and precision in that movement. The key component of a tournament that a fencer can influence is the individual matches that the fencer will fence. To prepare for such bouts, the athlete needs to train for the specific activities and rhythms of the competition. This means that the specificity, richness and effectiveness of the training increase the closer they get to combat conditions. The fencer must not only fence the same types of bouts that he will do in tournaments, but must be present for as many tournament conditions as possible. The more factors than those listed above that the coach can include in the training tips, the better the training will be.
Successfully addressing each of these elements means that the fencer will score more and more hits as their level of experience in the sport grows. Not addressing them, or addressing them incorrectly, will inevitably limit performance below the athlete’s potential. The touch is the product that operationalizes the preparation, not the preparation itself.
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