Hilt and Helm Fights at Lord Baltimore’s Challenge 2022
On July 1st 2022, I travelled down to Baltimore Maryland to fight in Tattershall School of Defense’s signature event: Lord Baltimore’s Challenge. The event spanned 2 days with a side sword, rapier, and rapier/dagger tournaments on Saturday and a whole suite of classes on Sunday. For those who don’t know, a side sword (at least according to swordwind.org) is a “…double-edged straight-bladed sword of moderate length designed to be worn and used with one hand.” If that sounds kinda like an arming sword or a rapier, that’s because they represent a transitionary step between the two as swords evolved through the ages to have more complex hilts. From a fighting perspective, side swords tend to be longer and have more complex hilts than arming swords (making them more protective), but are shorter and have beefier blades than rapiers (making them more ideal for cutting).
As a fighter who has fought in 3 tournaments in a single day I can attest that the experience is wildly exhausting so I elected only to fight in the rapier and rapier/dagger tournaments. Also as a fighter who lacks a side sword and has never fought with one, I felt my talents would be better spent as table staff for that tournament. For those who aren’t aware, when two fighters square up there are 4 staff roles that need to be filled.
2-4 Judges watch the fight, call out “POINT!” when they see fighters strike each other, and indicate who hit whom where.
1 Director starts the bouts, end the bouts when they see a scoring action, looks to the judges to determine where points were scored, and dole out points to the correct fighters.
1-2 ribbon runners put the correct ribbons on the fighters about to fight to indicate which color they will be and wrangle fighters who are on deck into position before their match.
1-2 table staffers update the score board and enter the scores into the website that tracks who won each match and how many points they scored.
No where in that last description does it say to shout out the points like you’re the announcer at a WWE cage match, but I took it upon myself to become the change I wanted to see in the world to hilarious effect. Some of my more notable quotes were:
“Ding dong ya both are DEAD!" - in response to a double
“Everybody’s DEAD now! Dun! Dun! Da da dun! Dun!” - in response to a double
“Winner, red fighter! Flawless victory!” - in response to red fighter getting 3 head shots in a row with a technical bonus on each pass.
“3 points, red fighter! Parry and re-punishment!” - in response to a really good parry and repost.
“3 points and a technical bonus to blue! Shot through the heart and you’re. to. blaaaaame!”
Hey, I feel like if you’re gonna do any job, you might as well have fun with it.
As fun as the side sword tournament was to staff for, unfortunately it went way behind schedule which caused the event organizers to make 3 big changes to the following 2 tournaments. Instead of putting a pool in a predesigned spot, when a pool finished they would put the next pool in what ever ring was available. Good move! Secondly, if the fighters were not where they needed to be when the fight was supposed to start, they had 10 seconds to get in place or they would lose the match and give their opponent 9 points. Harsh but fair. Lastly, only the top 8 seeded fighters from the pools would go on to eliminations. This I found immensely frustrating. In the first draft of this blog entry I went on and on about how much I really don’t care for this last decision, but in retrospect I realize the sticky position the tournament organizers were in when they had to make that call. I get that their other options were probably to have the event stretch on until 8 pm, issue refunds, or shuffle the last tournament to Sunday which would completely mess up the class schedule. So as frustrated as I was with how this decision would impact my standing ultimately, I realize now it was the best decision in a pretty crappy situation. Hopefully next year they learn from their mistakes so at least the top 16 people will get to go to the elimination round.
Let’s however, discuss how the single rapier tournament went for me. Quickly and poorly. In the single rapier tournament, you only get 3 passes or 90 seconds to perform 3 scoring actions. This ruleset favors patience, speed, and precision. You need as many clean high scoring hits as you can get with very little room for error. When you see an opening, you’ve got to be able to strike it quickly and accurately without giving your opponent an opportunity to parry and repost. In each match I walked up to my opponent, got in distance, and waited. If they step out of measure or approach I calmly step to retain measure and resume waiting. I call it the “Jason Voorhees” strategy. Most people are super uncomfortable when their opponent stands perfectly still in a sword fight. By doing so you don’t give any tells to your opponent that can clue them in on when you’re actually about to attack. It makes them question which openings are actual openings and which are traps that you’ve deliberately laid to lure them in for a parry/repost. At that point they start transitioning between guards purely out of nervousness. I’ve learned not to pounce on the first opening I see just in case its a ruse, but if they establish a pattern between transitions its a pretty safe bet that they aren’t setting me up and its safe to attack. This strategy works on opponents that are slower than me, which is most in the longsword world but not so much in the rapier world. It resulted in a tie, a win, and two losses. The bad part of being the best at your club means you don’t get to fight faster more skilled opponents until you reach the tournament. My strategy relied on being faster both offensively and defensively than my opponents and the fighters in this tournament parried and reposted my attacks more quickly than I’m used to. One highlight goes out to Daniel Daugherty who during our fight we lunged at each other and his sword completely pushed my mask off my head. Thankfully we were both in control enough for no one to get hurt, and me so much so that I turned to the camera his wife was holding and winked. Ultimately I placed 16/44 in single rapier. Didn’t get to go to elims, but it did free me up to square off against Patrick Braton and Airrion Scott in some unofficial bouts. Those two are seriously fun to fight.
Next up was the rapier/dagger tournament. In this one, instead of 3 passes you actually got to just fight for 90 seconds with a stopping clock. Whoever had the most points at the end won. This is my kind of rule set! Most people look at the dagger and go “Oh my God! I’ve got another thing to stab people with! Let’s get my money’s worth!” and just start charging in all willy nilly, but in my experience its better for defense; especially mine since it has a nice sail guard on it. In rapier dagger, both opponent's’ best offensive move is to thrust with rapier and strike with the dagger as a method of last resort. The best defensive move is to parry their rapier with your dagger, and repost with your rapier. Knowing what their best defensive move is, my strategy was to bat their rapier out of the way with my dagger, go for the thrust with my rapier, and when they try to bat my rapier out of the way disengage around their dagger to land the thrust. This strategy worked super well in my first 3 fights all of which I won. One highlight from my fights was my second opponent. I’m not sure what her name was, but all I remember is that she showed up with a helmet, a pair of gloves, and chain mail shirt and no other protective gear. I’m not sure who the hell thought that was a sufficient amount of gear but I’m telling you it ain’t! Her bare arms were exposed! I did my best to hit as quickly and as lightly as possible and to only hit her helmet, but for the love of God please wear at least a fencing jacket if you’re going to compete in a rapier tournament; if not for your sake for your opponent’s.
My forth fight; however, had two opponents and one of them was heat exhaustion. The air conditioning at the gym was either broken or woefully underperforming because it was as hot and humid as a jungle in there. Growing up in Baltimore I used to be acclimated to that type of weather, but having lived in Pittsburgh for the past 11 years I’ve lost my tolerance. I’m not sure what the hell happened in that fight. All I know for sure is that after I lost I plopped down in front of a fan trying desperately to lower my body temperature and unfortunately it was blowing hot air at me. It wasn’t a hydration problem either because I drank 13 bottles of water and sweated every drop of it out. The lesson I learned here was if you’re going to a tournament in the summer, bring icepacks! That loss cost me getting into the elimination round which made me angry, but even if I had gone on the heat was so intense that I wouldn’t have made it much farther anyway. In the end I ended up placing 11/36th.
Still though, although certain elements of the tournament were frustrating, I still had a wonderful time and I’ll gladly go back next year … with a cooler full of icepacks. My only regret that I wasn’t able to stick around for the classes on Sunday, but I did stick around to give David Scheid a crash course in longsword.
Shout outs go to:
Jess Rozek - for hosting me. Also thanks for inviting me to teach a class at Autumn Fecht! It’ll be my honor.
Lisa Lisoto - for putting on one hell of an event. Seriously the lunch was great, there was some very nice swag for sale online, and I really liked the vendors. Every time I use my new buckler I’ll think of you.
David Scheid - for asking me to give him a longsword crash course. Hope you had as much fun as I did.
Daniel Daugherty - for one hell of a rapier fight!
Patrick Bratton and Airrion Scott - for some very fun single rapier fights!
