What I Hate the Most About Sabre Fencing
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- Опубликовано: 6 июн 2024
- Another whinge.
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really great points, I often am stewing with frustration because at my local club I feel like there are so many simultaneous actions but then I think "well, at competition with other refs, they would be hair splitting this call" so I feel like I then have to hair split on details that I feel less justified with.
Re: your point about "who's less bad," our head coach tells me this joke: "I think in a decade with where saber is headed, competitions will have two pistes with two practice targets. Each competitor will get on the starting line, and advance lunge at the dummy, and the referee panel will score them"
Outstanding analysis of the current situation in sabre fencing. You have said out loud what other coaches and referees have said to me confidentiality in private.
the year is 20XX every sabre fencer is so good off the line that everything happens in the box, fencing has been pushed to the extreme now touches are decided before the bout based of which side has more A/C cooling them down making them slower by 0.00001%. This is the world the FIE want
I could totally see the FIE doing this
Part of the issue too with the attitude "nothing is simul" is the rules as written don't dictate that simul means mirror image. The rules clearly talk about the timing of initiation of the attack not how you carry out the attack.
Conventions however dictate you split as fine as possible and overall I find refs tend to award more towards short, direct attacks to a lower line than high line/head attacks even if the timing is very close.
This video is a great tack on to CryusofChaos' series on rules and conventions
What's the worst thing about fencing?
Is it referee corruption?
Is it the money/funding?
Is it the Olympic qualification process?
Is it the interpretation of the rules are controlled too much by a closed group of influential referees?
Is it that the rules should be clearer to reduce that influence?
Is it the low rates of drug testing?
Is it the severe burnout when young fencers are going to simultaneous rounds of cadet, junior and senior events?
There are plenty of great things about this sport that keep me competing 30 years since I started, but hard to single out one thing right now.
I fence saber, epee, and very occasionally foil at the local level. One thing that I have noticed is how much clearer it is to me in foil when I ask the referee about a call and they tell me what they saw.
Foil: Ah yeah okay that makes sense, I/my opponent did do that.
Saber: Really? Okay, if you say so...
And I have also been told during a referee certification evaluation (USA) that there should be very few calls of simultaneous, and that to a certain extent I have to listen to my gut or my instinct, because part of what you are trying to read is intent.
All of this makes my job as a coach more difficult, because I sometimes just don't know what to tell my students when they are confused about RoW and how they can get more favorable calls.
1. Great alternative i keep advocating: Single light gives 2 points, double light with priority gives 1 point.
Reduces referee impact by 50%, and makes single lights more exiting. Using it since years club internal and its incredible, everyone should give it a try.
2. On another topic, making priority more hand initiative based instead of movement direction, would help sabre.
3. To me simul is when both actions are inside human reaction time, so they *cant react* to each others action.
2 points single lights would make sabre bouts even faster and would be hilarious
@@brozomicki-sothe307 Ofc increase it to more than "first to 15", seems logical enough that i wouldnt have to mention it...
This is a good idea, actually.
@@brozomicki-sothe307 why?
@@christianschellbruck9788 If there is the option to score 2 then "first to 15" is reached sooner.
So it should just be increased to like 20 or 25.
The whole "there's no such thing as simul trend" is such nonsense. There's a certain point where if both fencers start and finish at the same time it should correctly be called as "simultaneous attacks" not "too close to split". It's incredibly frustrating that the new generation of refs are being trained this way.
It's so much easier to ref as well. Yes, if it's too loose you get non-committal chicken fencing, and that would be a huge issue on modern timings, but it's gotten ridiculous, and is acting to provide cover for some of the more egregious corruption.
In all the recent videos about the controversies in fencing, watching the touches I was always thinking like almost all of them should have been simul. But I wondered if it was just that I've not fenced in long enough that I've gotten bad at seeing what happens, so I'm glad to know I'm not the only person thinking that's an issue.
Saber fencing in 2024 is all about who's shoes the referee likes the most
Love the channel, great work. I'm an epee fencer so I always love to see right-of-way slander.
Excellent and a very level headed video! I like how you have discussed lately such important topics which, for some reason, do not get enough attention and are mostly ignored.
Totally.
I’ve been saying this for years.
If it needs to be split with a fine tooth comb it should be called simultaneous.
The idea that ‘there’s no such thing as simultaneous action’ is simply ridiculous.
And in foil as well, even though foil reffing isn’t currently nearly as problematic as saber.
Two attacks. Two lights. No touch.
no
I'm so glad to know I'm not the only one going "huh???" watching recent matches. I learnt sabre about 7 years ago, and simultaneous was taught as "no one made an withdrawal to their attack" (as in moving their arm back, etc) and "intent". I took a break from fencing for about 3 years and have recently started watching games again, there were so many touches that seemed like simultaneous to me were not called simultaneous by the ref. I thought there had been a change in rules in the years I haven't been watching games. This ruins so many amazing back and forths that could had happened and were actually of educational value. I'm relieved to know there are other people who also see this problem.
6:08-6:21 mic drop moment, bloody well said.
Very well said. At open fencing I often feel pressured to award a point when my heart tells me to just call it simultaneous.
As usual, I'm going to bring out my big insane suggestions.
1) Reducing timing back to 125 ms. I'll hate it, but I'll get over it.
2) Return to win by two points.
3) Sabre gets on guard on the two meter line and warning line, with 3 meters between the fencers. (You start at an end chosen by coin flip).
4) Every 4 validly started actions (false starts don't count) you start at the opposite end.
5) There is no simultaneous off of the line. If both fencers make an attack the fencer closer to their end gets the point.
Congrats, sabre will now have many more marches. Every bout will take longer, but actions will have the same pace. I see this as a feature, not a bug.
Insane but interesting.
I'm actually super down for 3), as I think it will solve more problems by itself than it appears to on the surface.
The spirit of right of way is that, in a real fight, you would not start an attack once u see your opponent has already committed to an attack that is going to hit. If the fencers themselves cannot tell who started first, they cannot be expected to change their action. Simultaneous action should be called if the difference is not obvious enough to the naked eye. Splitting things with slow motion down to milliseconds is not the way to go, fencing is not a race.
Also: Almost no Fencing club has equipment for high speed video analysis. So in the club you have to trust what the ref sees.
I haven't kept up with fencing as much these days, but I did notice that a couple years ago, Martilotti seemed to call quite a few good simuls the most compared to other referees. (He's the ref who called simul at that 4m action at 44-44 in the Korea Hungary final....the same match which got him and Papa Toure suspended for uhhh reasons.)
ive noticed this a lot recently too, i took a break from fencing for a couple years and coming back and watching a lot of recent videos from championships im always left questioning the refereeing of them. So many in the box points that didnt make sense, as well as a lot of other touches called that just shouldnt have been in any way. For example 'Madrid World Cup Cavaliere v Aron Szilagyi' twice a point was awarded to Szilagyi after an attack no, then a reprise, claiming that Cavaliere didnt take over the attack quick enough despite it being almost impossible for him to have taken over any quicker. I know no referee is perfect but I never saw this many poor calls years ago, like as you said back in 2019 the years of Oh Sanguk.
as a national italian referee i can say that i think as well that we need some simmul but not as much as in the past
Kendo seems to have this issue as well. On paper a double awards a point to neither, in practice it always awarded to whichever attack looked better.
I agree. I don't think it's the job of a referee to compare attacks for quality. Do they start at the same time? Are they correctly executed? My guess is that the difficulty comes as much from the fear of calling both attacks as incorrect as calling them both correct.
I get what Cyrus of Chaos is saying about shorter lockout to reduce the number of actions in the middle.
But for me the golden age of sabre wasn't pre 2012 it was that period between 2014 and 2019 where actions were being split in the middle, to allow for athletic AiP and punish hesitation. But not split so far that we get the "go to 0.01x slow mo and keep watching until you see a mistake, or make one up".
I have thought what you've said for a while, we just need to go back to admitting that simuls exist, and that actions in the middle don't just need to be marginal, but clear to everyone who's point it is. That is better for the sport, the athletes, and the spectators.
Bro u did szabo dirty with that thumbnail of him getting robbed at Tokyo
Loosen up the middle slightly, for sure.
Also relax generous timing for reprise takeovers after a clear miss, maybe make tous les deux blade actions go to the defender instead of the attacker, and you've got a much more balanced offense/defense game.
I think this is also happening in foil as well. Right of way nitpicking has gone a little too far imo
I agree so much, in the recent years the simultaneous calls have disappeared, and that’s such a shame because as you said, it feels like the referees are tossing a coin to decide who to give the touch to. Sometimes you just can’t separate the actions…
@@MorganLefeuvre i agree, especially with actions like attack on preperation and remises. Both are so subjective right now you have now way of knowing what the referee will say. I think we just need to keep it simple. Whoever goes forward has right of way and the only way the right of way turns over is if the opponent beats the blade, makes the attacker stop, or the attacker searches for the blade. I also think that the focus should not be on this but with blade contact and whose parry/counterparry it is. More often than not i find these actions more frustrating than pure ROW calls
Sounds like you want to do HEMA saber. come to the darkside. We have off line movement, and wrestling
In foil you get many of the calls where at 14-14 there is a simultaneous action multiple times in a row until someone does something creative enough, if simul would at least exist in Sabre that would force the fencers to fence more interesting.
Past experience speaks against your point.
The FIE have never changed the fundamental rules that define the attack, parry, riposte etc. I believe that refereeing needs to return to respecting these rules, irrespective of what the feet are doing, notwithstanding crossing the feet going forward and irrespective of which direction the fencers are moving. In other words, respect what the hand is doing. I re-read the section (t.84) on simultaneous actions this morning. It's not easy at modern sabre speeds, however it is achievable. The referee ought to explain their decisions in such cases as presented here. Perhaps what we are seeing is an attempt to achieve this.
Maybe we should only award points for single light hits? I also always come back to the concept behind the right-of-way, that it is attempting to answer the question, what if these were sharp weapons? Which is why we should respect what the hand is doing. The feet merely get you within range.
if we only awarded points for single light this would give the defender and incentive to only pursue counterattackes (i.e. to get their light on) instead of actually trying to defend and parry/get out of distance.
foil is so much nicer to watch. Its insane that such saber actions not called simultanious.
The issue is with the ruleset, not the referees. The referees has as much power as the ruleset gives them. I understand that it is not an easy task, especially with the level of athleticism today, to have a simple and clear ruleset where the referee will be more like an admisnistrator rather than a "decider". But in my humble opinion I think that this should be the way that FIE has to follow as a concept in updating the ruleset in the future.
I personally am not a fan of the rule of right of way in the first place. Do you think removing it at all would be too drastic of a solution to the problem of "needing slo mo cameras" and causing fencers to need to beat the other clearly?
Personally I think for sabre, two lights should indicate no point. It's faster than Epee, and as such, awarding a point to both would make matches go by much faster, and I personally think would incentivise better fencing, rather than simply continuous races to the centre where the point relies 90% on the ref making a call. Then again, removing right of way may completely change the sport as a whole and might end up looking like Epee with slashes.
Perhaps this is my HEMA bias coming through, but I personally would prefer to fence under this ruleset.
Any thoughts?
I understand that from a hema perspective double touches should not be awarded. However as you said this would turn it into epee but with slashing. Right of way cannot be eliminated from sabre and foil but the rules should be clearer and less subjective to referee decision.
We do this but the problem is that it is way too easy to get a light off on the box and the only always winning strategy is to just stand there and hit them at the same time. Modern electric sabers would need some sort of smart saber that insures only quality hits register but that still wouldn't stop people from either just blindly charging or counterattacking into any and all attempts by the opponent to hit.We can see this in some HEMA footage.
I've always found prep really hard to understand and apply as a fencer, I think it's a bit too subjective
Sandro vs Oh in tokyo 2021 13-13 pure simul
Saber MUST change after Paris 2024 or else its doomed
As much as I hated the shortened timing in Sabre from the 2000s to 2015 era (120ms) it did take a lot of calls out of the referees hands and did not allow quite such stupid holding type attacks as we see now. Also the referee prioritized the hand as the way of taking the RoW and not the foot. Go back and watch matches from the 2008 olymic games - it's almost unrecognisable. But better than the rock always wins we have now :(
A few years ago there were too many simuls. I watched a DE in the US where there had to have been 20 simuls, one after the other. Ridiculous. Now there are almost no simuls. The pendulum always swings too far.
I think the whole premise that simultaneous actions should be reduced or eliminated is misguided. I think it should be simply seen as a form of passivity. You have a lot of situations in epee with passivity from both sides. This is a bit similar - not taking a risk in order to gain priority in sabre is similar to waiting out of distance in epee.
Even the 2019 era and the 2010 era and the 2000 era had similar problems, not as much, but many similarly controversial touches. That desire to reduce the amount of simultaneous actions is many decades old. And there used to be a very natural solution to it: awarding a priority explicitly after 3 simu actions by flipping a coin who goes first. It worked very well. They took it out with the idea of making it easier for spectators to follow (simpler rules apparently) - well, I don't think that objective was achieved. On the contrary, now even top fencers are confused by what is going on.
Now it feels like there is an invisible coin toss
@@SlicerSabre Yup, exactly. I've often jokingly suggested that in this situations, it would be more fair to actually flip a coin a award the touch accordingly, rather than pretend there is some logic behind it and have people embarrass themselves by trying to rationalize the call.
So am I the first person to say they should be using slow motion cameras for this sport?
I miss “beautiful simultané”
What if they just remove right of way? If both get hit, either no point or both get a point like in epee. Would that make sabre fencers move more carefully and make the game more entertaining?
i think it would just turn into epee but with slashes
@@eggfriedrice225 true! And as an foil fencer i like the sport how it is. I have tryed epee, but i dont like it. Its too passiv for me. But i see the problems in saber. Maybe make the target size smaler in saber? Could help to have more parade riposte.
Has anyone try to play sabre or foil with the simple and relaible rules of epee?
Same thought! I wish it were like that. It's more realistic, and we might see more strategic moves instead of of fencers fighting for right of way, and strange referee calls.
its boring ive tried it before😅
with the timing of foil you could always make a double.
@@christianschellbruck9788 which turns it into epee but with smaller target area 😂
@@eggfriedrice225 No. I meant if the rules stay the same but make smaler target area so its more difficult to hit and maybe we see more parade riposte and longer duells
such fillers (didn't know what to do with footage....) always welcome!
Do HEMA. Do classical Fencing. Duelling Sabre, Military Sabre... Trust me, the grass is much greener here
My problem with sabre isn't the game itself but the lack of consistency and objectivity in rules. In that regard HEMA doesn't sound much better- no electric scoring, no single ruleset, no international governing body, etc....
3:46 "wE HaVE dIffErEnt opIonIoNs, diFfeReNT oPiNIonS"
rahhhh i can hear it in my head his voice is so annoying
At this point, I have given up on WotC. There os no love of the game or respect for it, it's lore, the creators, and especially the players.
Everything is just short sighted cash grab. Every product is just thrown together quickly and tossed out without any quality control.
No world book is supported with any follow up adventures. Core elements of the setting are just forgotten or handwaved. Who needs ship combat in Spelljammer?
WotC has become a graveyard for ideas, originality, and fun.
just make sabre without priority