Keeping Your Head Cool in a Fight

Stick avoidance. Hm. Seeing it on the course syllabus certainly didn’t ease my fears back in my first post. But how bad is it really?

As said previously, we are in the middle of practicing the three turns (meza volta, volta stabile, tutta volta) when the teacher starts walking among us with a stick. The goal? Don’t get hit. The rules?

• No flinching, whimpering, backpedaling or shrinking into a fetal position. Essentially: don’t be a wuss.
• No ducking. Not only would it be an impossible feat in armour, but a medieval nobleman is not about to bow in front of his enemy.
• No wrestling the stick. Just don’t do this.

In practice all we have to do is step aside and give the teacher a friendly pat on the back. And to be honest? It’s not that difficult. He’s nice enough to take it easy on us beginners, so as long as you notice him coming and aren’t cornered getting out of the way is easy. Provided you keep your head cool, of course.

That really seems to be the main goal of this exercise: teaching you to stay calm and collected in a fight. Granted, a guy with a stick walking towards you at a leisurely pace isn’t exactly a fight, but it’s enough to get us a little nervous. It’s when you’re nervous that it’s easy to make mistakes.