Infesting Lansing....the Roaches go to the Art of Combat's ISMAC

August 1-3, 2003

Hi. I'm Tinker Roach. I take things apart and put them back together
again. Sometimes I even manage not to wind up with spare parts...

Como se llama "Ouchi-poo?" Deconstructing two Spanish dueling systems as
presented at the "2003 ISMAC" fencing conference. The first is rapier work
presented by Ramon Martinez, and the second is the use of the Spanish knife,
by James Loriega.

1. Spanish Rapier

(I should call this La Destrezza, or more appropriately, "la destrezza as
re-created from the writings of Narvaez by Ramon Martinez, as he's
thinking of it in the summer of 2003, with the caveat that I only had two

Scholastic Roach: Sadly, none of this is translated  into English. One
hopes that Ramon will do a translation now he has finished his tapes.

hours to spy on him." But then I'd have to start using citations and the
like, and let's face it: footnotes are for higher life forms. So,
"Spanish" it is).
 

Scholastic Roach: Tinker, just because you are a roach does mean you can do
poor scholarship? What do you think this is? Western Martial Arts?

Practical Roach:  Tinker, have you been in Houston again?
 

Narvaez is a bad, bad man.

Troll Roach: good, good. Kill now?

Let's steal a line from Marc MacYoung, and get metaphorical for a second.
Let's think of combat training as a motor speedway. Under these
circumstances, the Spanish school of fencing is a souped-up little
rice-burning crotch rocket. The problem is, the handlebars are on
backwards, the clutch is upside-down, and the seat is exactly one inch wide.
That said, if you can figure out the controls, and you can also keep it on
the pavement, just about nothing short of a second-stage booster rocket is
going to beat it to the finish line.

Como se llama "the clutch is upside down?"

The Spanish rapier school as explained by Narvaez is the kind of
sword-fighting that could only be invented by guys who have a lot of time on
their hands, and who think WAY too much. While remaining sober. Being the
kind of roach who thinks too much, I like it.

Traditional Roach: That's not surprising. However since this is necromancy,
ones has to ask how they really trained people. I understand that Ramon is
working from Narvaez's work but does that reflect the way people were
trained? For example, look at the XingYi book by Shou. It starts with a lot
of the old texts and theory but in a traditional kwoon you would not get
those until you have studied for years. You are told to move in certain
ways, but the theory comes later...
 

Actually, I'll be honest -
Narvaez's method of using a sword scares the hell out of me. But I've been
told that the powers that operate the kitchen light-switch take a dim view
of my idea of going out and poisoning/gunning down all its teachers, so I'll
do the next best thing, and tell you what I think you have to do to survive
an encounter with it.

What? Well, yes, cheating is good. In fact, faced with any of Martinez'
students holding a sword, I think that guns and heavy flying objects are
definitely the way to go. Cheating is good. But it's a dueling system, and
it's a bad idea to put your second in a position where he's honor-bound to
blow the back of your head off. So let's play this straight and judge an
apple by the standards of an apple, rather than trying to make it satisfy
the entire US R.D.A. ...
 

Troll Roach: Narvaez  apple? Eat?
 

Let's get this straight right off the bat: Narvaez and Company are some
sneaky sons of bitches. They are absolute specialists at changing the rules
of the fencing game in midstream. That's probably why so much of modern
fencing, in spite of its history in France and Italy, is so clearly
derivative of Spanish blade work. But it's a pale attempt to imitate the
evil of the original devil. Here's what they do: they play almost
exclusively on a horizontal plane. The guy will stand straight and tall,
with a really long blade held at about 80-85% extension, with the elbow out
of line of the hilt. The hand is protected by a giant metal cup and two
long quillons, and so if you're within six and a half feet of the guy, he
can stab you. The arm itself is kept static, with all motion coming from
the movement of the torso via the feet (no shucking and jiving). In doing
so, they then either harass you into making a mistake with a bunch of
long-range cuts, or else they just sit there and keep their distance while
playing patty-cake with your blade, which is probably shorter than theirs,
especially considering how long they hold their arms. It's an obviously
long-range system.

Traditional Roach: Interesting, like all necromancy, one has to wonder what
is missing. We can't be the first people to notice this.
 

So what does Joe Roach do against a long-range guy,
especially when sniping at his hands isn't an option? He climbs into his
underwear and shows him the error of his ways... WHAM! Game over. The
Spanish school has nothing on the inside unless it's got a dagger drawn.
Its entire game is to pretend to be so good at the long-range game that you
have no choice but to close (and make no mistake, in his preferred distance,
you're dealing with a red-hot screaming demon), when what it's really doing
is trying to trick you into closing so that he can kill you off with a piece
of fancy footwork that redefines the centerline, and thus guarantees that
whatever the poor sap who closes tries to throw winds up threatening nothing
but empty air.

Scholastic roach: You know how the idiots who don't read are always
comparing the "Spanish circle schools are the pa kua of the west"? It really
appears to be more like Hebei shingyi, where you are constantly redefining
an angle of attack...

How much of the circle comes from a philosophical belief? And how much
influence on Filipino martial arts thought? Unless you find someone's notebook, its all myth.
 

"Dude the handlebars are on backwards..."
They do this by turning everything you know about fencing geometry on its
head. And they do it by going absolutely 100% rational. There's absolutely
nothing intuitive about how this works. You learn to step and move around
according to precise rhythms and timing while barely moving your upper body
and arm at all. It's all about "the pointy end goes in the other guy." The
centerline of the system isn't the fencer - and get this straight, or you
are going to die - I repeat, the centerline reference point is not the
fencer, but the line of the sword. Knock the point off-line and enter? No
problem, the Spanish guy just puts his point back in line to you, and leaves
it there while he moves his body very scientifically out of the space into
which you're attacking. Which mostly involves you leaving a very
embarrassed corpse as you accidentally toss yourself right the hell onto his
point.

That's it. While he can cut, and while he CAN play aggressive, the evil of
the system lies in being so nasty at one distance that you have to change
that distance or die, at which point the Spanish dude flips to Volume One,
p. 33 of "I've seen that entry angle before," and runs you through. Easily.
Trivially. Without working up a sweat. Against 95% of your fighters,
brawlers, and fencers out there, even the very good ones, it's a lethal
system, because it turns the whole idea of judging distance and timing on
its head. Sure, the Italian rapier guys have their volta, and are proud of
how daintily they can step offline. But in terms of sophistication of
footwork, it's like comparing Janet Jackson to the late Gregory Hines... the
latter not only has more options, but more subtle options for where and how
to step than anybody else, because they're not sacrificing training time
trying to learn to be good fencers at the middle, close, and
in-your-underpants ranges. And the Silver-is-God crowd who are all hung up
on true and false times are going to get their butts kicked by guys using
this system correctly, because by turning the judgment of space and time
into a game of Calvinball, the guy using Silver's method is going to think
he's winning right until the moment the Spanish guy's point enters his
sternum. And Narvaez's response to a "downright blow" is pure, unmitigated
evil. It's so evil I'm stealing it, and not going to share it. Find the
manuscript and read it for yourself.

Which isn't to say that Silver doesn't have an answer to the Spanish school,
because he does. His answer is that you're never going to meet a guy who
can actually do it they way he's been taught. And it's a good point: there
are tai chi guys out there who really can roll with whatever you give them
while simultaneously knocking you through a brick wall, too... but your
chance of bumping into one in a bar fight is about the same as your chances
of having your wife decide to set you up with a couple of supermodels for
your birthday. The method is so unremittingly cold, rational, geometric,
diametrically opposed to ALL of your mushy mammalian instincts, that your
chance of meeting a guy who a) has put in the hours to learn it and b) can
do it correctly, is pretty darned slim. And of those, unless you're a real
jerk, how many of them are you actually going to have to fight, and if so,
how many of them won't be satisfied with nicking you for first blood? Buy
the guy a beer...

Traditional Roach: So we return to Chesterton's Error of Stoicism? The
belief if you can do it sometimes, you can do it all the time? You end up
with the sort of debate you see, in my un-supported opinion, between Weaver style
shooter and Point shooters. I've often felt that the sort in what works is
more psychology that technique. I know people who make either approach
work...(MacYoung and Quinn have some interesting discussions on stress and
combat if you want to scurry farther in this pantry).

So we make him nervous or angry and it falls apart? That seems to be
the problem with this style. To quote "seldom is a man wounded into calmness".

But if that doesn't work, don't lose hope. The system DOES have weaknesses,
one or two of which are mechanical, and the most important of which is that
the system is based upon a dangerous assumption. All good roaches should
dedicate themselves to the study of dangerous assumptions... but first,
mechanically. They don't play on vertical space AT ALL unless it's in the
middle of a cut. Why should they? They're system is built around the idea
that their weapon is longer than yours, and it will be if you hold your
weapon on any kind of vertical. This would be slim consolation, given their
reach and giant bell guard, if it weren't for the second mechanical issue...
the system depends on precise footwork. Lure the dude onto bad terrain if
you can. Lose him the ability to step freely, and he's yours. But, being
smart chaps training in a system that involves thinking too much (remember,
while staying sober), they're probably expecting that. So, let's look at
that dangerous assumption.

"La Destrezza" is a system built upon the assumption that the fencer's enemy
is trying to kill him with his sword .
 

Troll Roach: means duel and an honorable foe? Ugh.
New Age Roach:  But dueling is how we maintain our honor...

Practical Roach:  (smacks the shit out of New Age Roach)

Okay, I can already hear the catcalls of "no shit, Spanky..." and if you're
part of the chorus, shame on you: you haven't studied your assumptions hard
enough. And no, I don't recommend trying to grab or kick the blade while
you enter: you might get away with it, but if you screw up even a little
bit, you're toast... and you gotta figure that anybody who fights at that
range will see the idea coming. Maybe not the kicking part, since most
folks don't practice that kind of thing...

Scholastic Roach: or don't anymore...the roots of savate are all over Europe
and look at some of the Spanish folk dance. The Basque play zipota. Maybe it was
was present and there were responses but they aren't recorded...necromancy
again...
 

But the Spanish dude's arm doesn't move unless he's throwing a big cut, or
else because his whole body has moved.

His body position and evasions are predicated on the idea that you're going
to want to close far enough to hurt his body, almost three feet away from
that freaking cup-hilt. So don't go for the cup hilt... the elbow is out of
line behind it. Play in his range. Take his blade, and make him think
you're trying to close, and then KILL THAT ARM! Take your time. Be
careful. I know Traditional Roach is going to scream bloody murder at my
saying that, but the system is built to screw you if you try to end it too
fast. If your system uses low stances, use them, and snipe at that arm...
do whatever your training provides for while targeting the arm that either
backs him in a corner where he can't use his footwork, or else injures that
arm so that he can't keep the very specific weapon alignments that his
system depends upon. Or, if you're a nut, give him a leg or hand or
something, and let him stab you... and then grab that weapon while you lop
his arm off with your blade. Do ANYTHING except trying to make a full entry
for a kill shot...

Because Narvaez is a bad, bad man, and dumb roaches who play into a master's
game get themselves stomped.
 

2. Keeping the Faith

"Those are the old guards. But nowadays we use this one, it's more
tactical." - James Loriega

Hi. Tinker Roach here again. If "La Destrezza" is the product of long
hours of practice based on stone-cold geometric meditations taught to the
sons of the highest of the high, playing at "Sevilian Steel" is the exact
cultural opposite, coming rather from average folks of several stripes
getting hot under the collar in low places...

In some ways, it is that strangest of all martial arts, a dueling system for
men with really big knives. Whereas the average "knife fighter" deals with
a make-believe universe in which Mr. Bad Guy waits for Mr. Good Guy to get
out his weapon before they start cutting on each other, for a period in
Spain, it actually happened. It brings a whole new meaning to polite when
"ya wanna step outside?" means going at it with ten inches of steel, in
front of a roaring crowd, in order to satisfy some issue of honor. In this
respect, "knife fencing" might actually be a better name for what is being
taught there...
 

Scholastic Roach: These things appear at various times. For example
in Jacksonian America, while gentlemen dueled with pistols, common folk used fists and knives.
Similarly in Mexico, there was a period where duels with large knives were semi-formalized. However, normally,
it appears knife fighting happened when other weapons failed or you were without access to better weapons.
Most of those disappeared because they were practical systems that evolved into gunfights. The whole
modern cult of the dangerous knife fighter has no basis in reality.

Practical Roach: Man, when you use a knife in the street, the target isn't supposed to see it happen. Unless its a.
you stick them before they know you have the weapon. Fair fights are for fools.

.

I'm going to say some fairly critical things concerning what Mr. Loriega
taught me in four hours, so let me make a disclaimer up front: I've got a
lot of respect for James Loriega, and I hope that you'll buy his book. If
you're into knives and the cultures in which they used, it really is a
must-have title. Loriega's done his homework, and 90% of the time, he
really knows what he's talking about. In fact, because I want you to go out
and buy his book, I'm not going to try to deconstruct the system for you.
Instead, I'm going to try to use my criticism of the seminar as he taught it
both to bring out some high points and truly useful stuff, and to try to
place it in the big bad world of hurting people for fun and profit.
 

New Age Roach: Tinker! That's bad. We don't hurt people...

Practical Roach: Or if we do, we try to do it so we can get home safe. I doubt the
common folk drafted into battle were half as worried about honor and fairness as they were getting home alive.
What's that saying "what matters is who goes home?"

Let's start with the guards that prompted that fairly mystifying quote up
above. After a lengthy and detailed description of the knives used in the
system and by the system-players' neighbors, in which he was gracious enough
to let total strangers handle part of his collection of hard-found antiques,
Loriega showed some of the old guards. I particularly like two of the ones
he'd rather set aside in his daily practice, the Navarrese and Window
guards. The Navarrese is the easiest to get into: stand bolt upright and
throw out your left arm in one of those Hitler salutes, and then bend the
elbow ninety degrees so that the left palm is sitting in front of your chest
or shoulder, palm down, with your knife hanging down along your right thigh
or knee (depending on blade length). I love this guard, especially in a
context where you're wearing heavy clothing or have time to wrap up the left
arm in a cloak, scarf, or something. The other is a weird one, the
Window... you hold your arms in parallel lines, like the top and bottom
edges of a window, and look through the space in-between them, with the
knife on the high end.

Traditional Roach: Things develop for a reason. MacYoung's book on practical 
knife defense recommends a very similar guard to the Navarresse. Variations are seen in
a lot of other places too. Why? Because it works by protecting most of you.

GREAT STUFF!! These guards, in a system where ambushes are not the primary
issue, unequivocally say "stay back, I bite." In other words, they address
the psychology of a man who just might be convinced to let you buy him a
beer. And they set up distance that your opponent has to deal with, while
presenting you lots of immediate, painful options for some bozo who's idea
of fun on Friday is to show a crowd how to do an emergency appendectomy. He
gives a nice "get offline and stick him in the neck technique," straight out
of my memory of Carmen I read in a French translation years ago... "ta garde
Navarre n'est qu'une bêtise," indeed... yeah, right.

Troll Roach:  Oh.  He's got guards.  (time passes)... Need my shotgun?

But they're not "tactical" enough for Loriega, who, drawing from some of the
ideas of JKD (this is not me inventing this, he said it outright in the
seminar), prefers a modified version of one of the traditional guards where
the knife is kept by the hips, and rather than having the off hand out
front, he prefers to keep it right up against one or the other side of the
neck. Which is a real pity, because, while visually more defensive, and
while keeping the hand out of the way of a threat, it's really no more
"tactical," or useful, than any other guard, and because it doesn't set up
any parameters of space in which an opponent must act, can actually be
argued to be less tactically sophisticated. There's a reason that
traditional European guards look the way they do, and that's to create
spatial topography for the opponent. The new guard, which looks very
Filipino, doesn't.
 

Practical Roach: because to quote someone who probably doesn't want it known
he talks to insects: "it leaves your dick hanging out."

Traditional Roach: It also leads to the question if this much has
 tinkered with, what of the original isn't and why were the changes needed?
Anytime you change a system, you need to assure the supporting parts aren't lost.

But that's okay. I have a serious, gut quibble with that, because I wanted
to see all the drills and techniques of the traditional system, as opposed
to the drills and techniques of the old system as filtered through his
understanding of JKD concepts... but I gotta at least give him props for
telling us what he was up to. In a context that is different than the
context in which this art lived, Loriega thinks that the art needs to be
updated. And that is the big difficulty with the seminar that he gives on
the subject.
 

Traditional Roach: So one has to ask is the system
 so arcane or so unrelated to the real world that its applications are nil?
Heck, even stuff like a kwan dao has teaching value.

Following the guards were basic steps, and basic cutting. And, working up a
good sweat. There's good stuff here. Since I've already got a knife system
under my belt that I know and like (and is compatible with everything else I
do), I doubt I would toss it out in favor of the cutting techniques that he
shows, but there are some real gems involved here: first, you only cut to
areas where an actual human body exists to be cut. Wow! Who'd-a thunk it?!
Already, the system starts with a measure of credibility. In particular,
the system advocates a strong cut from the wrist, and includes numerous
exercises to learn to both strengthen the wrist, and use it for a sort of
"explosive" cutting, to the point that you really only need to be able to
flex your wrist to make a deep, eight-or-nine-inch cut. This is a good
thing: lots of systems teach trapping techniques that assume that once
you've got the guy's arm bound, you can pretty much ignore the knife. Trap
one of these guys' arms, and if you don't have him bound up like a python on
a rat, he's going to carve you like a Thanksgiving Turkey. Unfortunately,
because he's mixing and matching in the seminar, and I've never studied any
JKD, I can't tell you how much of the various cutting and thrusting
exercises he showed are really Spanish, and which are blends. And that's a
real weak point, because the exercises don't look Filipino or JKD-ish... and
the stepping that you do with them feels pretty western and dance-like.
He's got steps, he's got evasions, he's got body shifts... and they feel     
like they belong. But I don't know whether or not they really do...

Traditional Roach: What is amazing is that the basic movements feel
so correct coming from a boxing-wrestling-bullfighting body movement. The body center is
the same and the type of long axis movement shows that this stuff ain't an import.

Then things went downhill, and my partner and I had a hard time keeping from
drinking heavily. During the last quarter or so of the seminar (and
granted, it was only a four-hour seminar, so we're talking REAL compressed),
Mr. Loriega taught knife defenses that were adapted from his system. And I
say "his" system, because it's brutally clear that they have nothing
whatsoever in common with the Sevillano system from which he draws his
material. To start with, his method is a dueling method. It assumes rules;
not many, but still, some, like, when you're in the bar and don't like
somebody, you're not allowed to disembowel the guy from behind on your way
to order a drink. THAT's knife defense, and the kind of attacks with a
knife that happen in the real world. Now, I've been attacked, and I've had
guys try to mug me, and I've been at gunpoint... but nobody's ever tried to
get me with a knife for real. So, those of you sporting the real scars,
I've made my disclaimer up front. But I strongly suspect that real-world
knife attacks don't involve a long, low, swinging thrust delivered with a
step from six feet away.

PracticalRoach: I have, and I know people who have been
--Someone who knows what he is doing with a knife blindsides you with it. Duels exist
in modern martial art folklore and in West Side Story. In real life, why give the sucker a chance?
 

New Age Roach: That's evil. What about honor and fair play? Are you a thug?

Practical Roach: Yes. I want to get home to the nest. 'Nuff said.

That's something I have seen before, and it's called
Ninpo, where they teach some old thrusts that had to be delivered with body
weight at an upward angle to get through armor. (Even there, I suspect it's
more of a teaching movement).... Now, maybe I'm wrong, and if so, I'll
apologize and suck on a can of Raid, but if that attack comes from the same
culture that created Flamenco, I'm Daffy Duck.

Troll Roach: Duck? Tinker not duck. Silly Tinker. Tinker bug.

The downhill slide accelerated with valuable self-defense moves like
grabbing the knife wrist with both hands while at close range (yes, there
ARE throws and breaks that can be done with this move... but what followed
didn't involve any of that, nor the footwork required to survive trying it),
or, avoiding said thrust by moving into the centerline and wrapping up the
thrusting arm, with no intermediary actions. Now, this was to give room for
a counter later, and I talked to Loriega after the seminar was over. He
used that wrap instead of something more realistic but also more difficult,
so that the beginners wouldn't be mystified... but he didn't tell anybody
that.

Traditional Roach: Maybe it was an intelligence tests? Sadly this reminds
me of an early SSI seminar  where a defense against an artificial strike was taught. The  
reasoning was similar. Diluting a system for a student's lack of skill seems like a bad idea.

Practical Roach: It depends...if you really think they are stupid, maybe its safer..

New Age Roach:  I thought that was how you get repeat business at seminars?

Traditional Roach:  WHAT?!

New Age Roach:  Well, you can't really have disciples and cultists if you let them learn...

Troll Roach: (crunching and grinding noise)... Bad roach!

If you attended that seminar and are some of the guys I was watching,
you came out of it really impressed with the value of that technique for
saving you against a knife... as opposed to the value of that technique for
winding up as a kidney shish-kabob. I was appalled at the number of people,
some of whom supposedly know how to use a knife, who thought that this was
great stuff. Could it be done? Sure, by somebody who is an order of
magnitude, maybe two, better than I am. But I think that even they would
agree that putting these techniques in the hands of beginners as a "standard
move" is like giving a kid a .45, and telling him it's a really cool new
kind of bb gun. Something unexpected and bad is about to happen.

The whole Sevillano thing is a dueling system. It's got nice cuts, nice
thrusts, nice evasions... you can work up a hell of a sweat, and if you do
ten or twenty thousand of each of the techniques and steps so that they're
written into your muscle memory, then you can start to really put them
together into something fluid and coherent that ought to make you a very
scary dude with a knife. It's not a system for modern self-defense, but for
fighting, usually under very specific circumstances. And that's what lies
below the surface of the seminar... there is a clearly western fighting
pedagogy just under the surface, giving little hints of its existence... but
you could never really know what was the Sevillian knife style, and what was
the James Loriega, summer of 2003 knife style.

If there is a real problem with this whole thing, it is not a sin of
omission: Loriega clearly knows his business. I'd happily train with him
again, in spite of the fact that some of what he's teaching beginners is
going to get them killed if they ever try it for real. The system is there,
and it's golden stuff... but it would have been a far better seminar if Mr.
Loriega hadn't felt the need to dress it up to make it something "grander"
than it actually is... which is a rock-solid knife system with its own
inherently valuable tradition and very obvious fighting potential. It's a
case of needing to "keep the faith," because the "outdated," "out of
context" original is clearly superior to the "modernized" amalgamation.

Traditional Roach: Isn't it always? At least when properly passed on?

3. Pugilism

No, its not about little dogs....

It's the Traditional Roach's turn and we are going to discuss Timothy Rizucki's

recreation of early pugilism. Now some caveats on this discussion: I am a firm believer

in the non-intellectual part of training and you will often hear me threatening to suck RAID

 because of someone's attempts to perform intellectual necromancy.  As we move along, I am

going to tell you why I don't see Tim's work as falling into that form of black magick.

Tim presented his work on recreating early bare knuckle boxing

 based on the writings of some dead English guy.

Scholastic Roach:  Now, I know YOU haven't been to Houston. 

Go stand in the center of the room with the light on...

He demonstrated and taught the stances, basic strikes, blocks and a few drills.

The class was excellent, although for a bare knuckle art, he didn't teach how to

 hit without shattering your fist.

Tinker Roach:  Dude, it was a seminar... there wasn't time for them

to punch a bag of buckshot a thousand times...

The drills were well done, although as is typical for a WMA seminar, a whole lot

 of the room was doing something.  Something else, that is.  He showed some combinations

 and actually got  a lot of stuff in, especially considering the students were mainly used to

playing at sword. At lunch, Tim and Ken Pfrenger demonstrated the techniques in a series

of rounds as did two of his students. At this point, my comfort level changes. It looked more

 like fencing than boxing, and yes, I know the quote about boxing being fencing with fists,

but that was written by someone trying to lift boxing out of its lower class origins. There was a

 distinct lack of focused movement by the fighters and of the cool techniques, the elbow blocks

 and chops Tim taught in the seminar, none were used.  It looks very much like a couple of

poncy fencers, all distance and hopping in.

Troll Roach:  Ken left ribs open.  mmmm.... ribs...

I don't call this necromancy, because Tim is basically working from modern

boxing back to its earlier and rougher roots. He has access to excellent documentation, as boxing

books are quite collectable and many reprints are available on the web. There are even films of the

early guys who were trained by the old bare knuckle fighters but competed under the Marquis of

Queensbury rules. Modern boxing can be considered as all derived from that one type of boxing.

Before it won out, other sets of conventions existed too. It's like the idea of school or lineages in East

 Martial Arts. (A similar situation existed in this country with wrestling in President Lincoln's day.

There is a good story about him and a clash of styles when he was a young lawyer.)  So the the data

trail runs from modern boxing back to the start of the sport, and he's got great information to work with.

Boxers and coaches seem very prolific when it comes to documenting what they do.  I  think Tim's

current stuff is lacking a certain emphasis: Tim is very good at recreating stuff from old manuscripts,

but most of his past work has been sword related. He's done enough stage combat not to be distracted

 by the flashy, but I think that some attitude washes over from fencing where a strike can be fatal.

Practical Roach:  And if Tim ever happens to be chasing you

 down the street with a spiky coffee table, look out.

Scholastic Roach: When asked about this, Tim points out  that is is

totally within the tradition, as I suspect there was a lot of variation

It's a lot harder to kill someone even with an ungloved hand. You need a lot more strikes

 and damage, more combinations to drive someone down.  Boxing's roots are also lower

 class and the gentlemanly nature of fencing (Tim is one of the more noble people I've met)

 doesn't contribute to the rough and tumble. All this stuff about the sweet science, the noble art,

 the fencing with fists, etc., is pure bullshit. Boxing, fisticuffs, pugilism is a lower class game and

 niceness wasn't part of it.

A second concern is Tim's people train with grappling gloves, which are about the same as light

bag gloves with fingers...

New Age Roach:  Ow!

<smack>

Practical Roach: Kinky, but what's the problem?

Even well before gloves we used in the ring, they were used in training so you

could practice the techniques and learn to move right without taking lots of damage.

I think that needs to be reintroduced if you're ever going to get the body movement right.

Now they do use head gear but I still think some drills with gloves would be good. I understand

his concerns about people need to learn how to hit and the bad habits you get with gloves, but his

 students seemed very impact shy.

            Tinker Roach: But that's not a problem with Tim or Ken.

Still, it's better than necromancy:  the patient is on the table showing a resting pulse of two...

 but at least the patient's not rotten, unlike modern boxing past the Golden Gloves stage

 where there's money to be scammed.

New Age Roach: So will the patient survive?

Traditional Roach: The prognosis is good.