For anyone that's ever changed hands...

[Marvin]

Okay - background: many of you know that I messed my right shoulder up a couple of months ago. It's healing well, but it will still be several months before I can fight right-handed.

Soooo.....

Innocently enough, I asked for advice, and a certain Sir Jean Paul says...

'Fight left-handed' or something like that...

'Great Idea!' Thinks me. So I set out to learn how to fight as a mutant.

The part I thought would be difficult ie: throwing blows, turns out to not be all that hard at all. I know what the proper mechanics are, I just turned 'em mirrorwise - though to be honest, I nearly broke my wrist the first full-speed wrap shot I threw.

What's driving me nuts is footwork. My feet simply will not do what I want them to do. You would think this would come natural for me as I normally fight from the right foot forward stance, but that seems to make it even worse. I managed to fall flat on my butt last night doing footwork drills in front of my own pell!

And my defense, oy!

I'm sure, in the vastness of this archive, that someone else has done this. Anyone have good tips on learning sword and board from the opposite side?

[Bedlam]

A long time ago, I had a round shield that strapped so that I could wear it on either arm. Occassionally at practice I would switch to lefty. My defense was ok because whenever I fought with a round shield, my sword was more active in defense.

The first couple of shots I threw were usually pretty good, but after that, the technique went out the window and I couldn't have hit a buffalo in the butt with a snowshovel.

If I were to do it again, I would concentrate on slow movement for a long time, until I got the technique right including footwork. Then I would go to the pell for speed/power. Then there is practice and the experience that pain brings.

BEDLAM

[Talan Gwyllt]

As a two sticker I can only say practice practice and practice. Did I mention practice? Pell work is a must I believe. Slow pell work at that. I am no expert by far but this has been my experience. Learn to throw a left wrap to the body. It's one my best kill shots. Also see if there is a lefty in your area to learn from! Beware wraps to the back of the head from righties. Also you will need to be more active about protecting your left leg. Righties love to close and throw to that leg. CONSTANTLY. Depending on your gaurd. A frame or a hanging gaurd. Good luck!

[Jean Richard Malcolmson]

I am a confirmed mutant. I am ambidexterious (write, throw, bowl left-handed, bat, play tennis right-handed). Every time I approach a task for the first time I have to stop and figure out which hand to use. For things like hammering or sawing, I just switch back and forth when one side is tired.

I was able to borrow a right handed shield when I first started fighting, so I fought right handed for over ten years. I plateued out as a mid level squire, and my knight found out that I was a lefty and had me switch over to fighting left handed. I was knighted two and a half years later and was Crown Prince six months after that. I now have well over ten years fightiing lefty.

Yes, it is very alkward to switch. Partly because of using different hands for different things, but mostly because the left on right fight is very different from the right on right fight. Give it time. Many of those you fight will know the right on left game better than you know the left on right. You will learn to tell from visable body parts when parts that are hidden behind the shield are not properly guarded.

The possible bad news would be if you are so right hand dominate that you will never wrap your head around the body mechanics of fighting lefthanded.

Regards,
Richard
Ansteorra

[Christian1095]

Hi Marvin,

"I'm sure, in the vastness of this archive, that someone else has done this. Anyone have good tips on learning sword and board from the opposite side? "

I'm Christian Von Nuremburg from Atlantia and I'm squired to Duke Anton Tremayne... I had a very similar problem. I destroyed my right wrist at OCS and had to switch to being a lefty. I got reasonably good as a lefty before I got crippled again.... so now I'm a fencer....

Here's the best advice I have... If you have ever relied on your brute strength, agility or speed..... Forget it.... at least starting out. If you expect to win fights you need to win the head game.... Learn to define your triggers (ie, seeing the opening to unleash your offense) Also, lean to use your feet to put you in the right position. I'd hazard to say that the bulk of the fights I won were because I had superior position on my opponent, not because I was fast...

One of the things I did to wrap my brain around being a lefty was to do a WHOLE lot of slow work on a pell.... like an hour a night or so.... My focus wasn't on how hard I could hit or how fast, but rather, how could I get my rebellious left side into shape. Also, to learn how to throw a wrap, I practiced throwing a tennis ball... the whole key though was to go slow so I could understand how my body worked.

Also, if you have some really top end fighters in your area, make sure you take every opportunity to train with them... set training goals.... For example: I trained a whole lot with Duke Logan... After eating a Baby Sandwich, he'd ask me what I wanted to work on... A great deal of our fights were him pointing out the BIG GAPING HOLES in my defense and working with me to close them up. Also, I found that when I would let him know what I was trying to work on, the practice would be a lot more productive for me....

When fighting your peers, I would advocate just taking a "fuck em, they signed a waiver" attitude and just make every attempt to beat the living hell out of them... I found that I could compensate for a lack of skill by dipping into my "inner mean" --- since you're fighting at a disadvantage, you need to treat the fights a lot more serious. I found this helped me re-establish my place in the food chain... also, if you're about evenly matched with your oppoenent, then "in thoery" the guy with the better tactics should win.

When fighting someone who is not your peer, I would advocate trying to find perfection in how your body moves. Throw the perfect offside and don't settle for a sloppy bout.

Hope that helps.....

Christian

[JPT]

Kind of like Jean Richard, I'm one of those mutants that doesn't really care which hand I use for most things. My wife says that's just because my brain isn't properly connected but that's another story.

I started out fighting left handed sword and round shield and made the conscious decision to switch to right handed because it fits in better with some unit formations, and for a couple of unrelated asthetic reasons.

What I've discovered is that which hand is dominant is not as important as which foot is dominant. As you're discovering, the footwork is more difficult to work out than the hand work.

Here's my recommendation. Take a stab (pardon the pun) at fencing. You don't actually have to fence, but a right handed fencer leads with their right foot where as a right handed sword and shield fighter leads with their left foot. You don't actually have to fence (don't want to damage that shoulder) but get with a fencer if you can and have them work on advancing and retreating with you as well as circling motions. You basically have to train your body to move the opposite way it's used to, and that means developing muscle memory.

One other thing you might want to do (and I recommend this for anyone who wants to learn to fight two stick) is to learn to juggle. It will help you learn to track objects moving in space without actually zeroing in on them, and will teach you to use both of your hands in harmony.

Have fun.

[Gaston de Vieuxchamps]

How bad is your shoulder? Should you be giving it more rest of is fighting lefty really a safe way to go?

If your shoulder is "pretty good" but also "Not good enough to throw the kind of sword blows I wouldn't be able to keep myself from throwing so I would hurt it again." then you might want to consider using a center grip shield. It will make the transition and footwork a lot less traumatic (you might already be doing that. The down side is that center-grip might be too hard on your right shoulder.

I'm a lefty through and through--no ambidexterity here--but I often fight right-handed for fun and to help train right-handed students.

It works best when I get aggressive.

Lefty footwork isn't easy. It is the main reason lefties have an advantage in our game--righties rarely learn how to take advantage of the kind of footwork needed to fight an opposite-hander. Give yourself time in that area.

[Heairn]

Marvin..

I had to change hands, but for a different injury. I blew the ligaments in my left wrist, and was unable to block or maintain any kind of rigidity in the wrist afterwards. My injury was about 8 years ago, and it took about 2 years to heal. But I wasn't going to quit fighting so I strapped a heater on the left arm and started "mirroring" my lefty stuff to the right. It had the advantage of giving me some blows that righties don't tend to develop. (offside quick snap, for instance) The difference between you and me (aside from the righty/lefty lefty/righty thing) is that my wrist was what's broken, not my shoulder. It's harder to work a shield with shoulder issues than with wrist issues.

For footwork, I started out in gunslinger, going right foot forward for the "familiarity" and eventually worked into the dynamic motions for basic right-handed stances. But, all in all, the real key was practice practice practice. Take your correct stance, then mirror it.. pell time.

Good luck.
Malcolm

[Jean Paul de Sens]

Marvin, you doing both better and worse than I did.

While I didn't have much trouble generating power (as a matter of fact I was hitting harder with my left due to lack of control) my targeting went form Minuteman accuracy to Titan VII accuracy (maybe someday I'll get to Peacekeeper accuracy )

I also fight goofy foot, and when I switched to lefty I found myself in the same goofy foot stance...i.e. right foot was still forward. My question though, is are you fighting an open stance, or a closed stance? I found I flowed and moved a lot better in an open stance.

Also, what kind of shield are you using and what kind of shield were you using?

[Marvin]

Wow - that's a lot more than I expected, thanks!

Okay - the shoulder is not that bad. It just can't sustain lots of quick motions in extreme ranges. It doesn't seem to hurt after I do my morning pushups. I can lift with that arm and use the hand even in fairly extreme attitudes (like over my head) but my range of motion is down about 15 degrees or so and throwing a baseball even a few times hurts like hell.

I've been told that it will be at least September and most likely November or so before I have full use of the shoulder back. I just can't wait that long to get back out there! I've only fought four times since last November due to injury and it's really starting to grate on me.

Right handed I use a 23" x 34" slightly curved heater and fight in a goofy foot, semi-open stance with a hanging defense. I can easily change over into a modified Oldcastle when I feel like I need more power - rarely an issue in Meridies.

One other factor I neglected to mention - I am very nearly blind in my left eye - I have almost zero central vision and limited peripheral vision. That's why I use the funky stance - it opens up my field of vision some.

I was planning on switching to a center-grip shield just as Gaston suggested. I suppose I should get off my butt and make the thing.

I am very right-hand dominate, but can use the left hand some. I used to be that rarest of baseball beasts - a switch-hitting, base-stealing catcher. I weigh a little too much to run the bases now, though.

But I'm tellin' ya guys, the footwork's gonna be the death of me...

Thanks for the input everyone. It is truly appreciated.

edit - actually my typical guard is more of an 'A-frame'. At least that's what they tell me.

[Vebrand]

Hi Marvin,
Learn to define your triggers (ie, seeing the opening to unleash your offense) Also, lean to use your feet to put you in the right position. I'd hazard to say that the bulk of the fights I won were because I had superior position on my opponent, not because I was fast...

Hey Marvin does this sound familar.

Talk to Rashid or Rainald they probably has an extra center boss lying around you could play with till you get one made. Don't over think it, I know how you like to do that Just go out and see what happens then work on it from there.

Vebrand

[Alcyoneus]

Wow - that's a lot more than I expected, thanks!

Okay - the shoulder is not that bad. It just can't sustain lots of quick motions in extreme ranges. It doesn't seem to hurt after I do my morning pushups. I can lift with that arm and use the hand even in fairly extreme attitudes (like over my head) but my range of motion is down about 15 degrees or so and throwing a baseball even a few times hurts like hell.

I've been told that it will be at least September and most likely November or so before I have full use of the shoulder back. I just can't wait that long to get back out there! I've only fought four times since last November due to injury and it's really starting to grate on me.

When I was 37? My right shoulder was dislocated, and broken (accromion process) when it was put back in place. Of all your bony parts, that is the one you LEAST want to break. It's thin, and after about 30 there really isn't much living bone to grow to join the break.

I couldn't even use the arm for most of two months, it was dead weight hanging in a sling. If I wanted to move it, I used my left hand. After a month and a half-2 months, I could walk it up a wall with two fingers, to put the elbow on a shelf so I could use the hand to help wash my hair.

Needless to say, there was a period of time I was rather worried.

I was able to fight again after 3 or so months, with weekspots in my motion. My opponents couldn't tell very well though. I don't think I will fight w/o a pauldron on that side.

For any serious injury, it will take a year or so before you get close to 100%, that's just the way the body works. So, do what the Dr says, and exercise it when it is time. The Dr told me that after a point, it would not gain in strength until I started using it.

[Christian1095]

Hey Marvin,

I also fought goofy footed... so this may very well be of some use to you.

One of the keys to my fight was dominance of position. I figured as long as my lead foot was outside of thiers, I had better position to their outside. (IE, I could hit them but they were a lot more likely hit the shield) And since I was also goofy footed, it was a pretty easy transition to the deep offside for the massive blow to the back of thier mellon. (which left me in the classic "correct leg forward" stance...

What this left me, I'd sum up like this... I'd need to use the shield to block the offside and the deep offside... but if anything was coming to my open side, I'd either sidestep to maintain that superiority of position, or I'd blast into thier shield side with my right foot somewhere behind their lead foot (at which point I'd try really hard to paste them from there... since the next movement very well could leave me in a lurch...) -- so in both cases I'd refuse thier blow via position.

Also, this series seemed to work pretty well for me... I'd lead with an offside to thier grilll, then depending on where thier block left me, I'd either step deep for an onside strike to thier leg, or I'd step deep to attack the offside line... Also, I tried to avoid going toe to toe with the bad guy like it was the black death....

See a pattern?

Hope this is useful....

Christian

[Marvin]

Alcy - you can stop scaring me now... At least I didn't break it. I broke the left one when I was in junior high playing football (along with my clavicle and two ribs - I had this thing about throwing my body around). I'm truly hoping that a thousand years after I die, some archaeolgist digs up my bones and makes remarks about how dangerous life in the 21st century was.

Christian - you just described, in detail, the closing motion I use right-handed. I always tell my new fighters in my Mr. Miyagi voice: "Best defense? No be there."

Vebrand - Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm still workin' on it...

[Rainald]

Talk to Rashid or Rainald they probably has an extra center boss lying around you could play with till you get one made.
Vebrand

Marvin; If Rashid doesn't have one shoot my an email, pretty sure I got a round centerboss gathering dust in the backyard somewhere.