Some sweet saber sparring! (steel)

[Novastar]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8heSTBAvrw" target="_blank" class="aeva_link bbc_link new_win">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8heSTBAvrw</a>

Now that is some really nice stuff, hehehe.  

Normally, I don't find a lot of decently awesome "general" saber sparring out there online. This is pretty sweet stuff!

* Good management / understanding of the distance/measure.
* Good techniques applied overall, especially some excellent lunges.
* Good usage of timing in many cases
* I'm not sure how much tactics were applied... it's difficult to make a distinction for me on that in this video, but... usually, I can pick up on that during sport fencing bouts (especially saber)

So, in general, we're seeing the 3 most paramount foundations of martial arts being applied here, and quite a bit! Quite a treat in this vid...

[Master BStone]

Ah, the sabre days of yore! with a classically executed hanging guard no less! fun stuff. pretty good footwork too, with a heavier blade.

[Master Lucien Kane]

It looked to me like a decent amount of tactics were being applied. Both swordsmen were changing their guard constantly on the initiative. There were battles being fought before strikes were being thrown and that's a beautiful thing. At least that is what I saw from the video.

[Kham-Ryn Kurios]

Good post Master.

I always love watching videos like this.

[Novastar]

It looked to me like a decent amount of tactics were being applied. Both swordsmen were changing their guard constantly on the initiative. There were battles being fought before strikes were being thrown and that's a beautiful thing. At least that is what I saw from the video.

Right, we're basically saying the same thing here... although my point was... I didn't really see lots and lots of CLEARLY distinguishable tactics all throughout the video...  But that doesn't mean they weren't there... and also--CERTAINLY I saw SOME. 

[Master Lucien Kane]

lol Of course, you and I are often on the same page I think. 

 With any style sword art so much tactical assessment is going on within each millisecond it isn't even funny. I think that's why Musashi preached Mushin (mind no mind) because if you have to consciously think about all the technical and tactical stuff you'll lose because your body won't be synced up with your brain. Muscle memory, or Mushin, or whatever you choose to call it, is essential to any style martial artist, especially when dealing with weapons. I see so much going on at an unconscious level here, these guys do not disappoint. However I'm ranting on at this point lol

Great find Novastar!

[Shalateaus]

great find master nova thats awesome whered you find this?

[Novastar]

Anyone could.  I pop around y-tube all the time (practically daily, lol) looking for all sorts of good stuff, including martial arts vids, and even (duh?) tricking vids.

In essence... I look for stuff that I thinks at LEAST "honors" (if that's the right word) the three principles that *ALL* martial art must have (well, ok, for sparring / real-time combat).  If I can't see them occurring in a... how do I say this... "educated and not by accident" kind of way... or if I can see that one of the three is CLEARLY missing / being ignored... I honestly have to say--I need to draw the line there and chalk the video up to "BS".

Granted... ALL martial arts... are "good arts" in my line of thinking.  They can be expressed "poorly" or "well"... and some indeed ARE "more efficient" and some are "less".  So... yeah... sometimes--there ARE TOTALLY INCORRECT lines of thinking.  Other times... it's more up to opinion.

I like to find the videos that are fairly unquestionable as to their validity--again--based on the three principles.  Arguing about these three principles would be like saying gravity doesn't affect the Earth, or something like extreme heat doesn't affect the performance of electronics, or that the moon is made of cheese.  THOSE aren't "opinions", they are just flat out WRONG, lol...