DESCRIPTION

2004 Fencing world cup in Bupadest, Hungary in Men's Epee. The fencers taking in the final of this world cup are. Kolobkov RUS, Schmid GER, Boczko HUN, Jan FRA, Fischer SUI, Strigel GER, Martinelli ITA, and Fernandez VEN. Each bout is different in that it allows the viewer to see difficulties presented by fencing a particular opponent and the way each fencer tries to overcome them. For example in the first bout Schmid GER, fences Strigel GER through out the bout both fencers tend to be very reluctant to attack, as the bout progressed the fencers got used to their opponents patterns of attack, to the point that any attempt for an attack is met with a placed counter attack giving a double touch or a touch in the opponents favor. At 13-13 with Strigel GER having the won coin toss, the bout becomes amazing as Schmid GER now has to raise his level of preparation to overcome Strigel’s counter attack. As both fencers jump in one place, Schmid does a complex patter of beats from 4 to 2 to 6, which Strigel ignores, by just keeping distance, it is at this time when Strigel firmly believes and follows this pattern with no reaction, does Schmid place an explosive attack following the small almost passive beat through 4. This preparation for an attack seems to be the most important thing in this World Cup; while Schmid gets away with a straight fleche in this last touch, Boczko HUN works much better with an attack with a disengage. In his bout against Martinelli ITA, who seems to be much involved with taking the parry 6, Boczko works very hard not to end up in Martinelli 6 by counter attacking and disengaging. The result? Martinelli cannot adapt, the reflex for the 6 is so strong that irregardless of score and situation his hand makes this wide circle opening his body for attack, Boczko must have landed at least 5 touches in this manner.

Then we have Kolobkov, the “Tsar” of Epee, who unlike Schmid or Boczko, does not do his fleches straight on attack or with disengage, but rather on preparation; the speed and the finesse which they are executed with leave a feeling of “shock and awe” not once do Boczko and Fernandez simply shake their heads in distress for in all honesty they are doing the correct motions, but Kolobkov is simply too fast to overcome.

Finally a curious “what-if” of the DVD is the Fischer SUI vs. Jan FRA bout. Many fencing experts following the 2000 Olympics have often perceived Fischer SUI to be a toxic physical fencer on the strip, and one may wonder if this judgment of him had the necessary effect of forcing the referee to give him a red for corps a corps. The situation would not have been as important had it not been 14-14 in the additional minute, with Fischer winning the priority with a yellow card for a previous offense. Fischer known for his straight fast fleches, executes this one, ten seconds into the minute, being parried he remises, lands the touch, collides with Jan and falls off the strip. The referee gives red, Fischer loses, but if one is to slow down the DVD play to .5x you can clearly see the touch is made before any body contact, guess Jan FRA is happy there’s no instant replay in fencing.

This video comes from fencingwebtv.com