Being a competent referee is a useful skill set for any fencer. Club referees increase the value of club competitions and of individual competitive format training bouts, by introducing the outside stimulus of officiating to the bout. However, at an even more basic level, if you understand what a referee does and how he or she does it, you will be better able to integrate referee decisions into your competition planning. So how do you develop refereeing skills?
The simple answer is study and practice. However, your club or salle can help this along by an organized approach to referee skill development.
First, competition training bouts should have a referee assigned routinely. Referees are the third person on the strip, and the fencer must fence the opponent and the referee. Having a club policy to include refereeing solves the "I hit you," "but I had right of way," or "I was first" argument scenario. It also helps develop the talent of reading referee knowledge, understanding, and skill in the bout.
Second, the starting referee should develop the ability to call parts of the action, one at a time. The first step in this is simply being able to call the attack. The starting referee watches the bout, looking only for the attack - who starts forward motion of the blade to threaten the opponent's target first. When there is a hit, the first level's only responsibility is determining who made the attack.
The next step is to determine if there was an adequate defense that either parried or caused the attack to miss completely. The second level starting referee now calls attack and first defense.
Step by step, sophistication is added to the referee's skill set. This can be tied to specific training aims for the fencers. For example, if there is a problem of hesitation in several fencers' execution, the starting referee can be asked to assess whether hesitations in the attack allow the stop hit, or whether hesitation in executing the riposte is enough to give the remise the right of way.
The first parts of this process are all centered on interpreting the blade and body movement in the context of the flow of the fencing phrase. The issues of one foot off the strip or whether the fencer is centered in the strip on the command to fence are important, but trying to integrate them with the essential action early in the referee's development is a challenge that can get in the way of the key skill, interpreting the phrase. Similarly, the introduction of voting and managing the judges is a relatively late component of the training program.
Even if your club does not have an established way to introduce fencers to refereeing, you can do this for yourself. Ask two friends to let you practice just calling initial right of way. And if they complain about the results, have them try it. They will quickly learn that refereeing is not easy and that it takes practice.
About this Author
Walter Green is a Maitre d'Armes (Fencing Master) certified by the Academie d'Armes Internationale. He teaches modern competitive and classical fencing, historical swordplay, bayonet fencing, and Asian martial arts swords at Salle Green ( http://www.sallegreen.com ), the fencing school he operates in Glen Allen, Virginia. Maitre Green also trains fencing coaches through the Pan American Fencing Academy ( http://panamfencing.com ).
Copyright 2010 by Walter G. Green III. All rights reserved.
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