The Armour Archive

What are the body mechanics required to land a stout thrust?
What drills can be used to create the muscle memory for this sort of thing?
What drills can be used to improve targeting?

I'd like to start adding sword thrusts into my toolbox, and would like to build them up the way I have the rest of my shots, with lots of practice.

For discussion of the appropriateness of the thrust, please go here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=138900

Wrist strength is more important for the thrust than any other shot. Striking in line with the center of your target is vital to avoid glances. If you are fighting very round people the axis of the thrust must be in line with the core of the mass.

I assume you mean single-handed sword.

targeting is easy, just find a tiny spot on your pell or wall and thrust at it. Usually good thrusts are like sticking your thumb in the eye. Normally when I don't stick a thrust it's because I don't follow through (due to impending threat) or my wrist breaks (not the bones).

The best way to thrust is to figure out thrusts that look like your 'real' shots. I.e., throw a wrap, pull it short and earhole the guy.
(note: in some kingdoms/regions a thrust to the ear is not good. So you might have to adjust it to the jawline)

Throw and offiside to the face, shorten it, and push with point in line. Develop a thrust that looks like your regular flat snap to the head.

Practice feints with the point to see where / how your opponent reacts.

Sigifrith Hauknefr wrote:Usually good thrusts are like sticking your thumb in the eye. Normally when I don't stick a thrust it's because I don't follow through (due to impending threat) or my wrist breaks (not the bones).

Not certain how hard sticking the thumb in the eye is, I don't do it that often.

I aim a face thrust so the tip of my sword will contact 1/2" to 1" below the skin if the helm isn't there. Usually the helm is a good inch in front of the face and weighs almost as much as a head so it absorbs about half the speed and the head only rocks a little. I throw as fast as I can to still land that deep and that hard.

I aim for a body thrust at least 6" deep in my opponent. Sometimes I aim for out the back. If it were a knife instead of a sword I want to bury the blade to the hilt so my opponent is dead and the Forensic Investigator from the OJ Simpson trial assumes it must have been made by a professional athlete. It's about as hard as I might gut-punch a heavy boxing bag without breaking my wrist and often thrown with my hand near my right hip, muscles tense and driving with shoulders through legs. I expect it to move my opponent back and me in the opposite direction.

...then again I'm a desk jockey not a professional athlete so the results probably aren't nearly as dramatic as I would like them to be.

I don't make multiple sewing machine stabbing motions any more then I would throw multiple flat-snaps. It's a full body motion from the hips up and needs counter-rotation as part of a combination between shots. Face thrusts I can throw with motion from the shoulders and out rather then legs and hips but even then there should be enough shoulder motion that it can't be done repeatedly without at least some upper-body counter-rotation.

My preferred body-thrust starts with a high combination pulling your opponents defense up. Then I lean right as if I had steped right and throw a thigh level wrap shot. As the shield goes out I'm pulling back and dragging the tip across the shield. Timed properly the sword will release from the shield just as the edge passes the midline of the body. I step LEFT while my opponent is still thinking I'm going right and drive in off my rear leg (that didn't step right) for the buckle of the kidney belt. If the shot doesn't land I'm usually pulling the sowrd back, trying to slap my opponents sword hand towards his shield and coming over the top to strike at his sword-side head. That can lead into any typical close combination you like or use it to suppress your opponents weapon hand while you get out of dodge. (presumes right handed S&S opponent)

Good luck!
Sean

Get your shoulder and torso behind the thrust. Your body mass should drive it, not pure arm strength. Make sure it is landing in line with the axis of the sword, or it might skip.

The old "standard" used to be that a body thrust should move them back a step.

I like to make a snot bubble pop out of their nose.

Nissan Maxima wrote:I like to make a snot bubble pop out of their nose.

You're a fun guy. I like how you play.

Well, flicking the sword out there like it's some sticky lizard tounge and tapping someone in the face grill ain't it. However, that seems to be the tactic 99% of the time.

Cailin wrote:What drills can be used to improve targeting?

Basic "thrusting" pell":
Get a tennis ball. Attach a string. Hang from ceiling, tree, etc... Get in proper stance. Thrust at ball. Ball will start swinging around. Keep trying to hit it while it moves.

More advanced "thrusting" pell:

A tennis ball and two bungie cords. Attach cords to ball and to unmovable objects (walls, floor and ceiling, etc.) so that the ball "floats" freely in space. Get in proper stance. Thrust at ball. When struck, it will move rapidly all over the place. Keep trying to hit it while it moves.

Alex Baird wrote:Get your shoulder and torso behind the thrust. Your body mass should drive it, not pure arm strength. Make sure it is landing in line with the axis of the sword, or it might skip.

This. One awy or another, for you to have decent mechanics behind it, and not just throw it from the elbow or wrist (Fabris complains about people being sloppy like that in the early 17th C), you need to have some level of shoulder/knee/ball of foot stack. Makes it harder to be parried, you can drop your center of mass in to it if you need to turn the thrust in to a cut and it's going to land a lot more solid than it otherwise might.

I believe that for most, generally the best way to throw a solid shot -- thrusts or cuts -- is to ensure that you not only generate the necessary power and momentum from the body (using any of the possible axes for generating such momentum), but to LOCK that momentum into the shot to ensure the momentum and force generated get sufficiently transferred into the point of contact. The specific locus of such "Lock" varies depending on the nature of the shot, but generally you are "locking" the shoulder to ensure the transfer of momentum. For at-range (long-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" is up in the deltoid. For mid-range (short-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" is down lower in the armpit. For in-fighting (zero-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" tends to be down in the elbow/triceps to ensure transfer of the force and momentum generated from the lower body rotations (or the upper body shoulder rotation or lean).

Thus, we teach that generally, truly "solid" blows are generated not just by extension of the arm from the elbow or shoulder or the rotation of the wrist, but must also be accompanied by the "locked" transfer of momentum and force from the body. Thrusts are thus not simply a reaching-out of the tip towards a target, but rather the locked transfer of momentum from the body into the target.

Hope that makes some sense.

Max Von Halstern

I believe that for most, generally the best way to throw a solid shot -- thrusts or cuts -- is to ensure that you not only generate the necessary power and momentum from the body (using any of the possible axes for generating such momentum), but to LOCK that momentum into the shot to ensure the momentum and force generated get sufficiently transferred into the point of contact. The specific locus of such "Lock" varies depending on the nature of the shot, but generally you are "locking" the shoulder to ensure the transfer of momentum. For at-range (long-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" is up in the deltoid. For mid-range (short-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" is down lower in the armpit. For in-fighting (zero-stem) shots and thrusts, the "Lock" tends to be down in the elbow/triceps to ensure transfer of the force and momentum generated from the lower body rotations (or the upper body shoulder rotation or lean).

Thus, we teach that generally, truly "solid" blows are generated not just by extension of the arm from the elbow or shoulder or the rotation of the wrist, but must also be accompanied by the "locked" transfer of momentum and force from the body. Thrusts are thus not simply a reaching-out of the tip towards a target, but rather the locked transfer of momentum from the body into the target.

Hope that makes some sense.

Max Von Halstern

Cailin wrote:What are the body mechanics required to land a stout thrust?

Begin with your arm held straight above your shoulder, elbow firm but not locked. Then let your arm fall backward, carrying hand and weapon in a 180 degree arc that corresponds with a twisting of the wrist to ensure the point of the weapon is towards your opponent as it passes mid-thigh. Then, at this critical moment, crouch down and bend the elbow while maintaining aim along a vertical line that extends through the opponent's center of mass. The weapon will naturally rise upward, plunging with great force into your opponent's taint and, perhaps, beyond.

Few can survive such a stout thrust to the gooch.

The initial basic thrust we taught in our Scholum was integrated with movement so as to ensure proper technique and sufficient "lock" to land a truly solid thrust:

Inside Baseline Uppercut Thrust Drill:

Swords are thrusting as well as cutting weapons and ability to thrust is an assumed part of both authorizations and the art of swordsmanship. Thrusts are excellent shots of opportunities, as opponents shield maneuvers often make thrust openings available -- and they are excellent components of combinations, as you can similalry make such openings become available by making an opponent move their shield through combinations:

1. Fighting stance facing your buddy
2. Compass-forward-left offside Long-stem head (starting from Outside Baseline through the Dead-Zone to the Inner Baseline)
3. Compass-backwards-right raising arm into locked offside (Ham Sandwich) or Hanging Guard-like position
4. Hip-Rotation Uppercut-Thrust (face) forward (the hip rotation will bring the arm and shoulders forward). [This is the technique, rest is drill]
5. Recover

Guys with super-light hilts will always have a harder time getting thrusts to land hard.

Make sure your thrusting tip is the MINIMAL legal size. You don't want an inch (or above) of foam up there. Make sure the top of your thrusting tip is FLAT as a pancake.

When I land a perfect thrust it really bangs the target good- I have recently knocked back a few guys where their whole upper body hinges back at the hips a couple of inches. It has to nail the target squarely.

Vitus, I stab plenty hard with a tip heavy sword and light basket. I started doing a lot of thrusting when I was doing late 16th century Polish. I liked the tip heavy, light handle feel, it reminded me of a karabela.

Wish you were still in tucson cailin i would show you some stuff. Sadly its harder to explain it, than it is to demonstrate it.

Tip heavy, huh? Interesting.

Hold your sword with the blade (forte) resting on your shoulder and the pommel pointing at your opponent. Yank your hand down hard until your elbow is bent at ninety degrees and your sword is vertical. Extend your arm forward (throw your sword hand at your opponent's face) until it's straight out at shoulder height. The point of your blade should be in your opponent's face. Experiment with it slowly to get the motion down. Doing it slowly feels wrong. Do it fast a couple of times and it feels like the most natural thing in the world. Add some standard armored combat body mechanics to get your body weight behind it and it's a fast, strong thrust. An excellent technique for a left-handed fighter (or a righty facing a lefty) and you don't have to hit the face but that's the optimal target.

I learned how to do this watching Sir Strykar showing a sabre technique to another fighter at a Pimmit Hills practice long, long ago.

In the past, I made my thrusting tips by taking four disks of blue camp foam, taping them together, and then wrapping them in a 2" wide sheath of nylon webbing. that would be compressed a bit and and taped onto the tip of the blade. but it did create a rather large thrusting tip, I suppose.

How many disks of blue foam do you guys use in tip construction? or do you use something else all together?

Thanks for the feed back, it has been quite helpful. And I do miss Tucson, but Pittsburgh has proved to be very nice... if only our practice site would quit getting flooded.

My most recent tip I just used layers of the interlocking exercise pads.

Cailin wrote:How many disks of blue foam do you guys use in tip construction? or do you use something else all together?

Since the transition to low-profile tips I use 2 layers of 1 3/8" diameter blue foam if it's all I have or 1 layer of 1 3/8" diameter 'kneeling gardening mat' from Home Depot. It's just under 1" thick. I secure with a cross of strapping tape and then a sleeve of garment leather spray-glued and wrapped 1 & 1/3 around. The leather has no grain to tear like tape and tends to stretch outward when it needs to squish downward.

The tip is slightly bulkier then the rest of the sword but not by much and I almost never fail inspection. If I found an iron pipe of 1/8" smaller diameter I'd sharpen it and cut them that size instead. I like to cover in screaming red or bright pink tape for the tip. Occasionally I'll fight someone who says "Hey, you didn't announce you had a thrusting tip!" Yeah, I didn't announce I'd be fighting with a heater shield right handed either. Some things you just need to become aware of, and if you don't then assume the worst not the best.

Luck!
Sean

I found that targeting was my primary challenge when learning to thrust -- I'd be thrusting for the face or a gap, and the tip would be a couple of inches off in any direction as I moved through the mechanics of the thrust. I had to learn how everything shifted as my arm moved.

Practice, practice, practice. That's the only thing that will teach you; that and being attentive to and aware of the mechanics as you practice them. Go through the motions slow-time to see how the sword, hand, wrist and arm interact during the thrust, then speed it up with a pell. Don't forget to get some hip into it, either!

Do that without your gauntlets, then do it again with them, then do it again in full armor. Even the best-fitted kit will effect your movement, so you'll need to know how its effected.

My thrusts still need work, but they've improved.

There is a mental trick you can play on yourself to perfect your thrust, insofar as accuracy is concerned. Stop aiming. What has a probability of happening when you aim at something? You will miss. You might miss a little, you might miss a lot, but you'll miss.

Instead, you must absolutely convince yourself that your target has become an atrractor for your tip. The pull that your target exerts on your tip must be so strong, it should surprise you how strongly, how unerringly you 'fall' towards your target. If you can utterly convince yourself of this, you will stop erring en route towards your target. It requires an instant and absolute focus on your target.

Every person whom I have convinced to think like this has astronomical accuracy.

B.A., I had to stop and think about that for a while.

I sport fenced for several years. And looking back on my past tournaments, you're absolutely right. When I was thinking on aiming, my thrusts had a chance of being off. But when I saw the spot I wanted and moved unthinkingly to it, it was as if the blade had come alive in my hand and there was a magnet drawing the tip. It was precisely as you described it. None of my thinking thrusts were as fast, powerful, or accurate as those times.

+1 on the magnetic attractor trick. It's one I teach in rapier too.

I also have zero problems throwing a damn good thrust with a light hilted sword.

I think Vitus is off base with that theory.

My sword is blade heavy, virtually no extra weight at the hilt since it's just a piece of hose for the crossguard with the pommel carved out of the rattan.

Baron Alejandro's description is surprisingly close to my method. I usually drop the point and let them move into my point. I don't thrust all that often, and more than half the time it's either a feint to stop my opponent from whatever he's starting to do. It's funny how much the threat of a face thrust will stop guys in their first motion of an attack.