Week 1- Jan 23-27
Welcome to my new blog!
This post will be dedicated to this week’s events at practice, as well as some of my goals based on these practices.
Monday: This was our first practice following last week’s meet at St. John’s University. Collectively, Penn State did not perform as well as we were expected to. Therefore, our head coach had a criticizing but motivational meeting to recount our results at St. John’s Invitational. On Mondays, we usually train with our strengthening coach, Mike. He could not make it this week, so instead of our usual conditioning, we had a ‘team bonding’ day, involving basketball and a game called ten passes.
Wednesday: Since we have morning practice every week day (7-9am), I attempt to go to bed at around 11. Tuesday night, I accomplished this, but I felt more tired in the morning than I usually do when I get my typical 5 or 6 hours of sleep. I believe that this is simply because I am not used to getting more than 6 hours of sleep. If I routinely got 7 hours of sleep per night, I would likely have much more energy in the morning. Practice started out very slowly, with some jogging, then 15 minutes of footwork, followed by a draining 45 minutes of drills. I struggle with drills because it is hard for me to really ‘get into’ the exercises. I understand the value in repeatedly doing an action so that it becomes muscle memory and can be applied more naturally in bouts, but I find them quite boring, as the adrenaline and rush that I get from actually fencing is missing. After doing drills, we had another 45 minutes in which we could free fence, or pick who we want to fence and for how long/ to however many points. This is my favorite part of practice, as we get to do what we love. I particularly liked fencing my roommate Alissa that day, as I was able to score some very nice touches on her.
Goals:
- Remember to use free fencing as a tool for trying new actions or working on and improving a certain action. It is more important to do this, rather than to simply stick to what I know and win a bout (match). Even if trying new things leads me to lose a bout, it will pay off in the long-run. This is tricky because at times, the coaches record your wins and losses during practice, but it is still more beneficial to use practice as a way to truly think about and work on my actions.
- Get 7 hours of sleep every night
- Try to make drills more realistic- as if I were fencing regularly. Add intensity to drills.
Overall, this week was a very positive one for me, fencing-wise. On Thursday, I discovered that next weekend, I will be traveling to South Bend, Indiana, for a meet at Notre Dame. I particularly wanted to be chosen to attend this meet because I used to live in South Bend and I am excited to see some of my closest friends. Aesthetically, South Bend is not the most beautiful city, but I hold a lot of great memories there and am very glad to be able to go back for the weekend!
Stefania, at practice, the drills to build muscle memory are great for simple actions because ultimately,everything else revolves around those simple actions. That is where you develop your style as a fencer. Try to be more creative, even in the drills, put your own touch, your own spice into it. Try more to distinguish yourself and not look like an academy cookie cutter fencer if that makes sense. Also I figured out setting multiple alarms in the morning helps the best with not being extremely tired or feeling like absolute death. Space them out 5-15 mins apart and set like 3 different ones. It should help.
Nice post, fence me more at practice 🙂
I love the set up of this blog. I think reading schedules and about your daily goals is really practical, but interesting.
I do not have a lot of experience with fencing, but from reading this I am intrigued to learn more about it. I am excited to continue reading about your blog; it’ll be interesting to see if you reach your goals, and how your goals change over the course of the semester.