A new London Longsword Academy scholar.

Saturday the 6th, saw our Charity Bash, & the long overdue Scholarship prize fight of Luke Rose.
So how did it go?
As usual I spent the days building up to the event fretting that barely anyone would show, that people would drop out at the last moment and that possibly, just possibly, everything would catch fire and burn to the ground. None of these things happened.
24 fighters joined the competition and a large contingent of guests, all of whom put into the pot for the charities we chose, amassing an excellent £600.

All of the effort and toil of sorting pools was taken out of my hands by the great help of Nancy and Helena (and of course Barney who turned up with all the pool forms in the world). All of this help meant that we were in and ready to roll within an hour.

On the whole, folks were ready to fight on time and, in order to allow free choice of weapons, had communicated their choice and level of protection to their opponent before the bout began. This meant we were able to mix dussack, longsword, rapier, sword and buckler, even sickle. all into the same pools, all judged by the same rules (to see the rules have a look at the posts from the last few weeks. I will repost them soon with notes).

For many of the fighters, yesterday was a steep learning curve, but my, they did rise to it well and it was lovely to see how folk adapted, either making a passive form more assertive, or calming a flail upon realising such vigorous blows and parries left them prone to facial battering. Their potential cover vanishing leaving them unable to do anything but watch the oncoming, inevitable blow. Hard learning that was received with much grace and good humour by all.

The judging overall was excellent (the only slight niggle possibly being Sally, whose strikes seem invisible). The rules seemed to work exceptionally well, allowing for simple and effective calls. There will hopefully be some more pics and videos of the event up soon, so I will save overall commentary for those. But well done, some great fights and of course a well earned congratulations to our winner Tim Fuke.

Luke Roses's Scholarship.

Nothing short of fantastic. I know that Luke has spent a long time practicing for this, a lot of time spent in hot rooms, in full jacket, gloves and headgear so that the heat would not be an issue. His stamina was never in doubt, nor was his will to fight.

However, I think Luke would admit that it was much more punishing than expected, the adrenaline, concentration and a somewhat uncooperative (as it should be) opponent, exerting a far greater toll than shadow sparring alone could ever do. But that endurance practice payed off and despite the strain, even the final painful, grating ten minutes - those harsh extended moments where his opponents started to press him more with more determination - he remained resolute. And I am happy to say he passed. I never had any doubt he would, none of us did, and we are all massively proud of him. Luke Rose is now a scholar of the London Longsword Academy.