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There is a slightly different intro to this episode as Guy is in Kansas being medievally wrestled by Jessica Finley. Hear the noises here!
Onto the interview: David Ito is a fire eater, an epee coach and former kendo player who plays with longswords now, based in Toronto, Canada. Of course, his main claim to fame, top of the resume, is he appeared on episode 25 of this show, back in December 2020. With the world reopening David is living the life of a literary swashbuckler: fighting with swords, hanging out with glamorous show people, and attending all the scandalous parties.
To find out more about David and his work, you can find him on Instagram @ittoswords, or the Toronto Historical Combatants at www.torontohistoricalcombatants.ca.
Our conversation covers David’s training routine – does he really still do 100 burpees every morning? We talk about keeping track of progress and the overlap between training for epee and for historical martial arts.
When we last spoke on episode 25, David’s best idea he hadn’t acted on yet was to start his own club. Well, he’s done it! He explains his goals for the club and where it fits within the sword community in Toronto.
David has also got into the tournament scene since we last spoke, with great success. He talks about how he trains and even if you don’t have as many hours in the week to train as he does, he has some advice on where to focus if you have limited time.
Transcript
Guy Windsor
David Ito is a fire eater, an epee coach and former kendo player who plays with longswords now, based in Toronto, Canada. Of course, his main claim to fame, top of the resume, is he appeared on episode 25 of this show. With the world reopening David is living the life of a literary swashbuckler, fighting with swords, hanging out with glamorous show people, and attending all the scandalous parties. You can find him online at ittofiresword and fencing@ittoswords. So without further ado, David, welcome back to the show.
David Ito
Thanks for having me, Guy.
Guy Windsor
Well, it's nice to talk to you again. I guess my first question, and anyone who's listened to Episode 25, will probably be thinking the same thing. Do you still do 100 burpees every morning?
David Ito
I actually still do 100 burpees. Not in the morning now. But every day, whenever I go training, so a lot of my training days now start about three or 4pm every day and conclude at about 10 to 11pm.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so you're running on a fairly late schedule, I guess this is because you're a performer. So you have to be awake in the evenings.
David Ito
It's also because I work at a fencing school and most of that programming happens after school and into the evenings.
Guy Windsor
Sure, so do you have an exercise routine that you do immediately on rising as you used to have? Or have you just let that go?
David Ito
Now that the world has reopened and started using the daytime to do administrative things, like answering emails, preparing for the day. So now I start all my training in the afternoon.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so 100 burpees is still a sufficient number for you, is it? I mean, you're not feeling like maybe you should have upped it to 150 by now. Can I just say, I once almost managed to do 50. So I'm teasing you a little bit. Carry on.
David Ito
Okay, so I have started doing twice a week, 100 of them, while wearing a 50 pound weight vest and my fencing helmet. So that only happens twice a week. But in addition to the 100 burpees that I do as my warm up for training.
Guy Windsor
So on that same day, you will do 100 without the weights. And then at some point later in the training session, you will do 100 burpees with a weights vest and a helmet on?
David Ito
Only twice a week.
Guy Windsor
My God, how do your joints manage to survive this?
David Ito
I don't go as fast as I can. It's a marathon, not a sprint, I'm getting older and I'm feeling the effects. I’m now middle aged.
Guy Windsor
How old are you?
David Ito
I am 41. So as at the time of this recording, I am about two weeks, just over two weeks away from being 42.
Guy Windsor
Wow. Okay, so yeah, I mean, I'm going to be 50 this year. So yes, I've been where you are. And I remember the feeling that injuries are starting to take longer to recover from and that sort of thing. So you're taking it gently by just doing your weighted burpees just twice a week then.
David Ito
Every two and a half minutes, the rest of the two and a half minute timeframe is a break.
Guy Windsor
That's a good way to do them, so you're not doing them consecutively. It's in sets of 10.
David Ito
Right now, in sets of 10. And as the weeks progress, I shorten the break by 10 seconds at a time between them.
Guy Windsor
Okay, that's a good way to do it. Yeah, I'm doing a kettlebell routine at the moment, which is a certain number of swings in a minute, and then you rest for the rest of that minute. And then you do them again. And you start out with five swings in five sets, and you build it up for you doing 10 swings in five sets. And then you add a set until you're doing 10 swings in 10 sets. And then when you get there, you go back to the beginning and you up the weight and do the whole sequence again. So yeah, doing it in sets probably makes quite a big difference to how dead or how likely you are to throw up into your helmet.
David Ito
Oh, yeah. And journaling. Keeping track of this progress is absolutely vital. There's a lot of writing things down to keep track of the exercises I'm doing and the amount of time they're taking.
Guy Windsor
Okay, because if you're not doing it to a consistent time, you're adjusting the time down, you have to kind of remember where you were. And even with my quite simple kettlebell routine, I have a whiteboard in my study and I mark off every workout with the number of repetitions and the number of sets, because there's no way I'm going to remember what I did last time, because that was like two days ago.
David Ito
Exactly. Life happens.
Guy Windsor
So we are going to be talking about some of your tournament training stuff. But is there anything else you want to go into about how you're training? Because I think you are, in the historical martial arts world, I think the number of people who could do the training that you do is probably less than a 10th of 1% of people currently doing historical martial arts. Because most of us aren't that fit. So any other sort of training tips?
David Ito
Well, I've been taking advantage of that footwork machine. You remember that I said about?
Guy Windsor
Oh, yes. Yeah, we have a video of it in the show notes for episode 25.
David Ito
So I do a lot of footwork. Right now, Monday through Friday, I spend at least an hour a day just doing footwork on that machine at various settings and varying speeds.
Guy Windsor
Wow, that’s a lot of footwork. Are you doing that hour again, in sets? Or is it one continuous hour?
David Ito
No, it's not one continuous hour, the different settings are between three to five minutes, each of the pre-programmed motions are three to five minutes at a time. And then some of the settings are designed where it'll pause for three seconds. And I know that it's going to pause for three seconds, so I can practice a certain motion. And a large part of the training has been every day I do this setting, or times. I know it pauses 30 times over the course of the three minutes. Each pause is three seconds. And in that time, I can practice the motion associated with hitting the hand and then I do that 60 times each round, four rounds, 240 times, five times a week, I practice hitting the hand 1200 times a week.
Guy Windsor
That is a lot of hand hits. So I imagine you must be quite good at them by now. By they way, are we talking epee for hand hits, I assume?
David Ito
And longsword.
Guy Windsor
So an epee is not a shinai is not a longsword. But you do all three. How do they relate together? How do they complement each other?
David Ito
In the training, what I've noticed is that when I attack people, the size of my attack is always the same if both of us are using the same length weapons, in the sense that if both of us assume a point forward guard, and I extend my arm and I find the tip of my sword in front of their guard, I know that if I move one foot length forward, I can reach their hand, if I move two foot lanes forward, I can hit the front shoulder. And when I'm fencing longsword, and we're both at a point forward guard, it's the same distance. I extend my arm and like point is in front of their guard when I extend my arm, one foot length, I can hit their hand. So no matter what weapon I'm using, I've been using the tip of the weapon as a visual aid to help me figure out how far I need to step to reach their hand.
Guy Windsor
Because that’s the thing, the weapons may vary in length, but your body stays the same size. So if your point is within a certain distance of their target, the same footwork motion will get you to hit the target regardless of what you're holding.
David Ito
Exactly, hitting the hands is actually a footwork exercise more than it's actually a hand exercise, simply because you have to be able to modify the size of the step to move only as far as necessary to reach the target.
Guy Windsor
Okay. I guess the main difference that I would think of in this regard between for example, epee and long sword. I'll only talk about epee and longsword because I've done both. I've never done kendo so I can't really speak to it. But there's an awful lot of stepping off the side with a longsword and practically none with the epee so are you using the same sort of linear sort of sport fencing footwork with longsword or are you using more historical footwork?
David Ito
I would have to say that I definitely do a fair bit of linear footwork in longsword as it's what I've trained the most, but I'm also aware of how my center line in relation to the other person makes certain covers more or less effective. And it's the same with epee as well. When I fence epee I try to be aware of how our center lines are oriented in relation to each other because it makes certain parries in blade engagements more or less effective.
Guy Windsor
Now for the listener who may not have an epee background, and may have trouble visualizing what you've just said, could you give us like a concrete example?
David Ito
Oh, yes, certainly, so if I’m fencing somebody whose right handed, we are both right handed, and they are slightly off to my left, it means that when I do the parry forward, or inside line parry, it won't be as effective.
Guy Windsor
The parry would have to travel further because they're further over to your left.
David Ito
And that awareness is universal to epee, longsword and kendo as well. That awareness of center line orientation in relation to the other person is universal.
Guy Windsor
Sure. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. And the same is true if they're off to your right, they’re enclosing the outside line, you have to go further around. I've not really thought of it in those terms before, but I had about eight years or so of competitive fencing, sport fencing. So I found it all in all sorts of ways really, really helpful when I was doing longsword fencing or rapier fencing or basically any kind of fencing because the tournament environment is fairly similar. Actually, my life would be a lot easier when training people for tournaments, if they just went and did a couple years of sport fencing first, because this is there's so much stuff you can pick up about how to fence which applies pretty much whatever it is you're holding.
David Ito
It certainly does. And it's why I continue to fence epee five days a week.
Guy Windsor
So you're working at a fencing club? What are you teaching there?
David Ito
So I am teaching primarily sport epee. And in the evening, some of the sport fencers there have decided to invest in HEMA equipment. And we've been doing longsword. I've had a bunch of sport fencers, and I do longsword on a fairly regular basis.
Guy Windsor
I love that idea. Because one thing I found like 20 odd years ago, most of the sport fencing scene had no interest in swords at all. They were interested in the sport. And so they didn't care about longswords or rapiers or any of that stuff. They just cared about foils or sabres. So it's really nice to hear that the in your club, some of these sport fences are actually also interested in swords as swords.
David Ito
They certainly are. I find that it's been mostly the adults that have been coming through. And there are also a couple of high school age students, they aren't necessarily interested in being competitive epee fencers, because they kind of find certain aspects of modern sport fencing to be suicidal.
Guy Windsor
Right? Yeah, that's an interesting question. Because in epee, if I remember rightly, if you hit me two tenths of a second before I hit you, you get the point.
David Ito
Yes, that is true.
Guy Windsor
And that does lead to using double hits, or not caring about double hits, so long as you are slightly ahead of your opponent and two tenths of a second is not a long time.
David Ito
That's a very short tempo. But one thing that epee fencing has done for me, is I started recognizing when I would likely be hit first, so I would not bother attacking. That's another way to use the epee training.
Guy Windsor
Yeah. And I guess just understanding the difference between the games as they're played. So the rules of epee encourage certain behaviors, the rules of longsword basically vary from salle to salle and from evening to evening, because there isn't one consistent set under which people fence. So it's actually kind of helpful having a fixed rule set with fixed weaponry and a fixed environment. So you can see how those rules affect behaviour. Because the same the same tendency for rules to affect behaviour is it's easy to see it in fencing because everything is consistent. And it's harder to see it in historical martial arts because the rule sets keep changing. But actually the same kind of adaptation to rule set occurs, no matter what the rules are, whatever weapon you are fencing. So on a slight tangent, what are the Toronto Historical Combatants?
David Ito
That's just the name I came up for the sparring group. It was just found martial artists, dancers and historical fencers from throughout Toronto. And we decided to start meeting up in parks based on the gathering restrictions during COVID. We started following all the rules on gathering outdoors during COVID. And we started playing outside on a regular basis. I came up with Toronto Historical Combatants for the name because of the acronym. So Guy, what's the acronym of Toronto Historical Combatants?
Guy Windsor
THC. Okay, not everyone will get that, do you want to unpack it?
David Ito
Oh, yeah. So it's totally a cannabis reference.
Guy Windsor
I know that.
David Ito
THC is just an acronym for the psychoactive component.
Guy Windsor
And so I take it your club is fairly mellow in their approach?
David Ito
I also selected that acronym because it made people remember it. Because in North America, like, what I tell people about the name of this organization, I then ask them, what's the acronym? And then as they're thinking about it, it dawns upon them. And I can see them smiling and giggling when they find out. And they remember it.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, excellent. So the last time we spoke, your best idea that you hadn't acted on when I interviewed you was creating your own school. Is the THC becoming a school?
David Ito
That’s the plan now. I've hired one of the epee fencers I watched grow up at the fencing school and helped raise now makes website. So I want to hire them to do that. I have people that are interested in learning about longsword. And in particular, they're interested in the sport type training, because they want to try to do the sport based longsword as well and participate in tournaments and in the wider scene. And there really has not been a group in Toronto that was interested in interacting with that aspect of the Historical European Martial Arts.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so you're very much tournament sport fencing focused for your longsword stuff, okay.
David Ito
Not just tournaments, just being able to fence more, okay, take a look at a lot of the other organizations throughout Canada, they're able to fence fairly quickly. Like they're allowed to experience the art and try light fencing or limited fencing with their friends. And though at least the one organization that is in Toronto, they're not as interested in sparring as often or fencing as often.
Guy Windsor
Sure, yeah, because their goals are more historical.
David Ito
Their goals are very historical, and they're very much interested in looking at the Fiore martial art as a complete system. And what ends up happening was grappling and dagger was a prerequisite to access the fencing. And what I was finding is that there were a lot of people who gave up. Because there was this barrier, where they had to interact with the wrestling and dagger section, in order to pass the test to be allowed to fence.
Guy Windsor
Hmm, that's funny, because in my school, we've never had a test you have to pass to be allowed to fence, because there isn't a really clear distinction between fencing and the rest of training. Because if you take at one extreme, you have a choreographical set drill, like you do this, I do that. And then at the other extreme, you have competitive free fencing. My curriculum developed into a spectrum between those. So at any point in any class, you'll be somewhere along that spectrum and you may move towards the free play end for one bit of the class and back towards the choreographical end for another thing and then it just keeps moving around. I've never seen the point of having a formal test to allow people to free fence. It strikes me as it sets free fencing as a separate activity to training whereas to my mind, free fencing should be an integral part of the training.
David Ito
And so do I. I’ve watched too many people give up because of that area, and that’s a loss of potential, and I found that people eventually people will naturally become interested in the grappling and the dagger when they’ve been fencing.
Guy Windsor
Because yeah, if they'd been pommel struck in the face, they have a vested interest in learning dagger defenses because it will work against pommel strikes. But if you've never experienced a pommel strike in the face, and you're not particularly interested in daggers, why would you bother with all that grapply stuff? I'm a strong proponent of the idea that every technical drill you teach a student should be a solution to a problem that the student has actually experienced for themselves. So, you started out with this very casual meeting up in the park to poke your friends in the face sort of club or group? Why do you want to formalise it into a school?
David Ito
I want to formalise it into a school because I'm getting to the point where I'm getting older. I have no STEM education, there's really not much of a pension or old age security for me to look forward to as an artist.
Guy Windsor
Fire eaters don't get a pension plan, usually.
David Ito
This is pretty much the retirement plan Guy, I'm gonna be teaching until I die.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so your goal is to make the club into a professional school, which will actually pay you a living.
David Ito
Or at least help me supplement my income. Like I said, at this point, like I was an employment social worker, employment counselor at my age, I got a pretty limited skill set.
Guy Windsor
Sure. It's a very cool skill set. I mean, fire eating is pretty cool. And swords. Very cool. But yes, I have a similar problem in that my skill set is not terribly lucrative. My approach to the whole old age thing is making scalable products like books and courses, which can hopefully make the money even when I have an off day or if I broke my leg or something and couldn't fence for three months, I could still sell books and courses and make money that way.
David Ito
Yeah, I think there's something about the drills that I found some of the things that I've done through my epee and epee fencing and kendo that I've been able to successfully translate over into doing longsword in particular.
Guy Windsor
So how is the transition from casual club to professional school going? Where are you on that scale?
David Ito
Right now we're getting the website done up, I'm going to be running the first classes starting in June and July. I'm going to be running them once a week. My sport fencing coach, my sport fencing employer has allowed me to use his space on Saturdays to start running my medieval longsword courses. I’m renting space from him, and he's definitely charging the below market rate.
Guy Windsor
Well, market rate in Toronto is insane, so yes, excellent. It's great that you're getting that kind of support. One of the things you're going to have to learn if you're going to run this school and make a living at it is you need to promote it. So what you should have done by this point is tell me the URL, just casually drop it into the conversation so that listeners who are interested can go find it. And also, we'll put it in the show notes. So what is your website?
David Ito
The website is going to be Torontohistoricalcombatants.ca.
Guy Windsor
Okay, perfect. Torontohistoricalcombatants.ca. Excellent.
David Ito
It is going to, I still have to put it together. I hired one of the students that makes websites, and we are going to put it together and hopefully launch it later this month.
Guy Windsor
Okay, we're recording this on the 18th of May. It's probably going to go out sometime towards the end of June, mid-July, something like that. So by the time people are listening to this, your website should be up and live so they can go and cheerfully click on t’internet and find you. Wonderful. Excellent. Okay. So, you're renting space from your fencing school? I assume you're charging like a monthly fee?
David Ito
Yep, it would be a monthly fee. That that monthly fee covers things like the classes and one thing that I bought to lower the barrier to getting people to fence is I bought 20 of those go now foam longswords.
Guy Windsor
Okay. Yeah,
David Ito
Because if you can get them playing, even limited fencing, it's what people are signing up for.
Guy Windsor
Right? So you're hitting very much the, ‘I want to fence with longswords’ end of the market, as opposed to other clubs in the area who are hitting the, ‘I want to learn knightly combat in a historical manner,’ end of the market. So yeah, your foam swords is probably a good way into that.
David Ito
And I also bought 20 of the plastic feders, I can't remember the name of the company, and I have the access to the fencing masks. So what people can focus on is if they want to do the longsword fencing with steel, they can focus on saving up for the protective gear and their steel longsword. And those intermediary steps with foam and plastic is something they don't have to worry about.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, so you've already sunk quite a bit of money into this?
David Ito
Oh, yes.
Guy Windsor
That's a lot of gear.
David Ito
It is. And I've also bought about eight pairs of the Red Dragon hand protection, which is fine for foam and plastic. I have access to dozens of fencing masks at the sport fencing school.
Guy Windsor
Okay. So yeah, so you really need to make sure the business side of the things work, because you're already quite deep in the hole.
David Ito
Oh, yeah. It was money that I had saved up.
Guy Windsor
I have a question for you. Will students be able to leave their equipment in the fencing hall? Or do they have to take it home with them?
David Ito
They will probably have to take it home with them, we do have some limited locker space.
Guy Windsor
Because here's my thought. When I started my school in 2001, I got a full time space pretty quickly. Like I got to Finland in March 2001. And I rented a full time space in June that year, long before I could actually justify it or afford it. I want a salle, so I did. I had some money saved up and used some of that to rent this out. Fortunately, students came in and so the rent got paid and whatnot. But the thing is, I put up racks so that students could store their swords as they eventually got around to buying them at the salle. And I introduced a rule that if it's dusty, or rusty, anyone can use it. So in other words, it gets shifted on to the school rack. And you can come back anytime you like and reclaim your sword and put it back on the on the personal rack. But the rule was basically if you leave it for long enough for it to get dusty or rusty, it goes on to the onto the school rack and anybody can use it. By doing just that, within about a year, I could equip a beginners course of 20 people with steel longswords and masks, only through equipment that students have left in the salle.
David Ito
Wow, okay.
Guy Windsor
If you think about the money that's like, that's maybe 10,000 pounds, so maybe 20,000 Canadian dollars’ worth of gear that I didn't have to buy, which enabled beginners to get started. So if you can rig it so that they can leave their stuff in the salle? Great. Use that rule, it really does help. And for students who absolutely do not want anyone else ever touching their sword ever will take theirs home with them, and that's fine. But rack space is for people who are using who are coming to class regularly. And this way, if they don't come to class regularly, then the school gets to use their equipment sort of in lieu of renting the rack space. Okay, so as long as you're upfront with everyone about the rule, that's fine. I never had a single complaint about it.
David Ito
I actually happened to also own eight steel feders right now.
Guy Windsor
Eight? Oh my God.
David Ito
Two Fiore templated blunt longswords.
Guy Windsor
Excellent.
David Ito
But these are things that have accumulated over the years.
Guy Windsor
Sure. Okay, now, since we last spoke, you have been getting heavily into the tournament scene. And given your current level of fitness and training and whatnot, I think people might be curious, how do you prepare for a tournament?
David Ito
Okay, so last time we spoke was 2020. Had I done any tournaments when we met or was I just about to do them?
Guy Windsor
I think you may have done one or two, but you were very much sort of starting out in the historical martial arts tournament scene.
David Ito
So I do what everyone should do. I try to go to bed at a reasonable hour. Try to wake up early. Eat properly throughout the course of the event, things like fruit, nuts. Mix electrolyte powder into water, and also chug a lot of coffee. There's a lot of coffee that goes into that.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so coffee for like on the actual tournament day, but in the weeks leading up to the tournament, what do you do?
David Ito
Oh, so in the weeks leading up to the tournament, like, I spend 30 to 40 hours a week engaged in fencing.
Guy Windsor
Right. Okay, that would do it.
David Ito
There's not much additional that I really need to do. Some new things that I actually will do is because at any given time, I'm in a state of almost near overtraining or exhaustion. So I will actually slightly decrease the amount of exercise that I do in the lead up to the tournament, just to make sure that I recover properly. And that's one of the things that I do to prepare for a tournament. The other thing that I tried to do to prepare for tournament is usually in the lead up to it, I do a lot more fencing, light sparring, and I just do a lot more of it.
Guy Windsor
Okay. Do you look at who's likely to be coming to the fencing match and watch their bouts on video or whatnot, and figure out ways of defeating specific opponents?
David Ito
I haven't really done that. So in terms of how I've been doing in the tournaments. I haven't really watched many videos. But one thing I do notice, anytime I do watch videos of others, is I just watch the frequency with which they fail to extend their arm first. And if they're failing to extend their arm first, there's really not much need to watch any more. Or if other things that I notice is, if I do watch video I’ll watch the quality of their footwork, and how often they're trying to seek a second intention action. I’ve noticed that a lot of people are trying to set up binds in winds or using the descending cut to get the other person to parry so they can do the second intention, horizontal cut to the other side. And so if that's how people are fencing, then usually that's all I need to know.
Guy Windsor
What do you do about it? If that's all you need to know, what has it told you and what do you do?
David Ito
So people aren't extending their arm first, it means that it's going to be fairly easy to tag them in the hands or hit them with the attacks into preparation or disengage counter attacks against them. If the quality of footwork is sloppy, it actually means that they're expending more energy per second when they're moving. So they're going to tire themselves out, if they are taking large and judicious steps back, I might as well just get them to step out of the ring or force them to the edge of the ring. So they can't keep retreating. And if people are regularly trying to set up this Zwerhau movement, it means that they're committed to getting close, which means that they're not necessarily used to fencing at longer ranges. Because one thing I have noticed now that I've been doing more tournaments, is that people tend to stand posta di donna a lot with the intention of cross stepping a very long distance to then be able to throw this Zwerhau or the mezzani cut from the other side. That's extremely far away, I find that most people are standing extremely far away from each other.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so what advantage does that give you?
David Ito
Well, I know that they're far away so that it just means that if I step forward, they're probably going to keep stepping backward. I know that if people are trying to launch the descending cut, horizontal cut combination, that they're probably going to try to like fence from too far away. And, okay, let's try and find the words to describe it. I’m used to fencing at a much closer distance from doing epee.
Guy Windsor
Right. Okay. So you what you will do is if they want the fence at a particular distance, you will crowd the distance on them.
David Ito
Yeah, because they'll step backward.
Guy Windsor
Either you run them out of the ring or you end up closer than they want you to be.
David Ito
Yeah, and usually, I fence point forward because of things like epee and kendo. Their first action is usually an action against my blade to displace the point. So then it's possible to do a disengage counter attack.
Guy Windsor
Okay, so as they come in to bind your weapon, you just disengage and hit them on the other side.
David Ito
It does seem like most people are used to fencing from the bind.
Guy Windsor
This is a funny thing. I've noticed this in a lot of sort of medieval longsword circles is people fetishize the bind to a very odd degree. So, I've heard people say that you cut to create the crossing, right, which to me makes no sense at all, to my mind, you cut to hit your opponent, and if they put their sword in the way a crossing occurs, but the aim is never to generate a crossing, the aim is always to either control their weapon, or hit them or both.
David Ito
Yeah. It seems like people are fencing in a manner to seek the bind to set up a second intention action. I think binding and winding are the things that you do that when you find yourself in that situation, it's not the thing that you're actively seeking to do.
Guy Windsor
Right? Because why would you?
David Ito
That requires you to get closer to the other person. I don't want to get closer to the other person because that's just more surface area, I have to think about covering. And so things that I've learned in epee and kendo was how to fence at those longer ranges. And it's been working, I think, since we last spoke, I did a longsword tournament in Minneapolis. And April, I did a longsword tournament in Columbus, Ohio, and I got gold medals in both of those.
Guy Windsor
You know what, a bit of actual sport fencing training really does help.
David Ito
And then I've been doing sport epee tournaments. And, so far I think in this year alone, I managed to accumulate four medals, just doing sport fencing as well. The season starts in September. So since since I started going into competitions very actively, it's been about six medals in six months.
Guy Windsor
That's not bad. Excellent. So clearly, what you're doing is working for you. I'm trying to think, the average listener is not going to be training or doing sword stuff, 30 to 40 hours a week, they have day jobs. But if someone is interested in tournament fencing, and they only are training, should we say, two evenings a week, for two hours at a time. What would you suggest they focus on?
David Ito
Footwork.
Guy Windsor
You’re a man after my own heart, sir.
David Ito
It’s the only thing that's applicable to all weapons.
Guy Windsor
Okay, yeah, fair point. I mean, I find the mechanics of Fiore’s longsword stuff is very, very different to the mechanics of rapier, which is very, very different to the mechanics of French foil as I studied it in the 80s and 90s. So there's a risk there that you end up with a set of, of footwork mechanics that works for any sport fencing, but doesn't necessarily work for like the actual martial art of rapier fencing, or longsword fencing or whatever. What do you say to that?
David Ito
I think, I fundamentally believe it's all the same, like, you widen your stance, you bend your knees, you lower your center of mass. Most of the steps that you take are the same, we're bipeds limited by the rules of physics, and how those rules affect their body. Like I find that in kendo, epee, as well as even in longsword fencing. A step forward is a step forward, a step back as a step back, you can cross step with them. You can step to the side, you can step at angles. We’re bipeds. It's universal movement.
Guy Windsor
But the stuff you use in tournaments is missing things like the turning actions you would use in for example, a hip throw.
David Ito
Oh, but I have pivoted on my feet to get out of the way.
Guy Windsor
Do you practice that?
David Ito
No, I normally don't practice that.
Guy Windsor
So this is my sort of cautionary codicil to the, “Yes, absolutely do lots of footwork all the time,” is making sure that if you're interested in historical side of things, make sure that the footwork you're doing is not just the stuff that you only do in tournaments, which have all sorts of restrictions, perhaps, on wrestling and grappling or whatever else. Make sure that you get your body used to doing all the motions that the art that you're trying to recreate requires. All right, now, a very important question. And I'm actually a little bit upset by this one. I have to know, David, why am I not invited to all these scandalous parties?
David Ito
If you’re in Toronto you could be.
Guy Windsor
Well, that’s fair enough. I need to get to Toronto for some scandalous partying.
David Ito
It's the scandalous type, the not safe for work type.
Guy Windsor
Splendid. Okay, and when we were talking before, I described my push up twisting squat jump burpees, to you. And I have to ask as a burpee person, have you tried my push up twisting squat jump burpees?
David Ito
It was agony. It was great.
Guy Windsor
That’s a good answer. And yes, it was agony, it was great. Not something you often hear together. But with these, it's good. Have you incorporated them into your regular training? Or did you just try them the once?
David Ito
I sometimes make the kids do them. I do them alongside.
Guy Windsor
Of course, I mean, you have to.
David Ito
I lead the kids through a lot of a regular calisthenic routine. And sometimes I always tell the kids that when I'm feeling really lazy, or in a very good mood, then I do 100 burpees in a row. I call it a really lazy workout, because I don't have to think about what we're going to do. And all I have to do is count to 100. So I don't have to engage my brain.
Guy Windsor
But what’s really good fun is when you get to like 98 or 99, you start losing count.
David Ito
I’ve done that. So the kids are actually done pretty good at doing burpees where they're talking while doing them. So when that happens, I said, oh, you're distracting me, I lost count. And then some smart asses do things like start calling out random numbers. If it’s sufficiently low enough, well, I guess I start counting from that number.
Guy Windsor
Fantastic. One variation that you could try, it solves the talking problem straightaway. What you do is you get them to take a deep breath, and breathe all the way out. And then do as many as they can before they have to breathe in again.
David Ito
Oh, that could better. That would be agony too.
Guy Windsor
It is absolute murder. And for extra points, you make the in breath that you eventually get slow. Don't just suck it in really fast. Just do it under control. It is a really useful discipline. I find it particularly helpful when, let's say you're fencing. And maybe, as I have occasionally done, maybe you've neglected your conditioning a little bit. And you find yourself getting out of breath when fencing, then the ability to continue moving while desperate for air is useful. But also the ability to retain control of your breathing even when your body is in a significant oxygen debt is really useful too.
David Ito
That's actually a good idea. I did something similar preparing for my first tournament in the States. We still had to wear masks. So what I did was I took some of my cloth masks, I saturated them in water and put them on my face and went fencing.
Guy Windsor
Agony! Oh my god, how was it?
David Ito
Oh, it was awful. But on show day, like the actual tournament day, I bought a box of medical masks and every bout I just changed masks so I had a dry fresh mask.
Guy Windsor
Which is luxury. If you're used to fencing in a wet mask having a dry fresh mask feels like luxury.
David Ito
It did, so I was intentionally depriving myself of oxygen. And that was at the first American tournament that I did. And I think that was back in 2022.
Guy Windsor
Okay, and yeah, it really makes all the difference in the world if you have the conditioning for it so that whatever you're doing in the tournament is not physically challenging. So all you need to do is pay attention to what your opponent is doing and timing and measure and that kind of stuff. Makes all the difference.
David Ito
It’s helpful. Yeah, so if I think about how often most people get to train, for most people training three times a week is a lot so for that six hours, I've had the good fortune of often being able to just do footwork for that many hours a week.
Guy Windsor
In addition to everything else. And also, one thing I find with the emptying your lungs and doing the exercise thing, if you don't have very much time, because you know, okay, you do this for a living, I do for a living, we don't really have the excuse of saying I didn't have time to train today. But for people who aren't in that position, they may only have five minutes, before a meeting or after lunch or whatever. And if you want to do fitness training, but you don't have very long, you build up the oxygen debt, not just by burning up the fuel, but by restricting the supply. So you breathe out and exercise like hell, without breathing. And you get that sense of oh, dear God, I'm going to die in seconds rather than minutes. So it saves a lot of time.
David Ito
Certainly does. So yeah, you're right. Any anaerobic activity like that is very helpful.
Guy Windsor
Sure. Okay, so the last time I asked you about the best idea you hadn’t acted on was start a school. And you’ve done that. So I guess my question now would be, now that you've done that, what is your next best idea you haven't acted on?
David Ito
Getting athletes on to the podium.
Guy Windsor
I love it. So, you are acting on it, though?
David Ito
Well, right now, it's just I've got to get them onto the podium.
Guy Windsor
Okay. When do you think you'll have your first students standing on the podium?
David Ito
Hoping? I don't know yet.
Guy Windsor
Do you have any students at the moment who are interested in that sort of thing?
David Ito
Oh, yeah, my hope is in November, we're doing the tournament within our province, and I’m hoping to get one of them onto the podium, because it doesn't matter if I can get myself up there. If I can get someone else up there, it means that I'm able to successfully transmit information.
Guy Windsor
Exactly. You know, when I'd been running my school for about two years, and this was in like, 2001 2002. So this tournament scene didn't exist yet. I was free fencing with one of my students who had no martial arts or fencing training at all before he started with me in March 2001. And about 18 months after he started in free fencing with me, He disarmed me, right. And seriously, still 20 odd years later, it is one of the highlights of my professional life so far, because it was concrete evidence that I could actually do my job properly. And in an environment where there really wasn't much in the way of external validation factors. There was no way to really test whether my students knew what they were doing or not. So having this this chap, Toppi, who is actually godfather to my eldest child, not just because he took my longsword off me when we were free fencing, but he's just very good chap anyway. But it was just holy shit. What I'm doing is working. So satisfying.
David Ito
Because we are temporary on this earth. And you create legacies by passing on information.
Guy Windsor
Right. So this episode will go out long before the tournament. If one of your students gets onto the podium, I want you to send me a picture and we'll stick it in the show notes.
David Ito
I would love that. Yeah, of course I will.
Guy Windsor
Excellent. Last time, you would have spent your million fictional dollars on getting equipment sized for every body. Is that still where you would put the money? Or would do you do something else with it?
David Ito
Research into equipment has been quite important. We are now seeing that manufacturers are taking a little bit more seriously making equipment and more sizes as the technology improves.
Guy Windsor
By itself that is a diversity issue. Yeah.
David Ito
Then next thing I might want to would like to actually see done is see more study done on the injuries that are happening in the sport. Because one thing I have noticed since I did start competing is that there are some hard hits. Concussions are a thing. People are medically retiring because of traumatic brain injuries. Something to the effect of being able to use that money to fund studies on how things like rule sets might especially affect the probability of injury.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, and it's worth noting that before this show goes out, obviously you won't have heard it yet, I have an interview with Sara Lewis, who got bashed in the head, and various injuries because of it. And so it's probably worth listening to that episode. It should be episode 162. And I also talked to Dr. Marie Meservy, in Episode 160, and she has issues around getting hit in the head, thanks to a very detachable retina. So people who are interested in that particular topic, both Dr. Lewis and Dr. Meservy are like in the medical space, medical professionals. So they have some very interesting ideas about maybe what we shouldn't be doing.
David Ito
One thing that I wish wouldn't happen is it like most modern HEMA rules is that they don't assign more point value to the head. And also, some of the after blow rules in what I witnessed was getting encouraged extremely wild swings for the head, because of the point value and the lockout time for the after blow.
Guy Windsor
Right. Yes. So basically, also reducing the incentive for hard head hits will go a long way to getting rid of them.
David Ito
And rule sets, I believe, will play a large part in that.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, absolutely. Have you given any thought to neck strength training as a way of preventing concussion?
David Ito
That's why I do burpees with a helmet on.
Guy Windsor
Right. Okay. Yeah, I hadn’t thought of that. Do you have any other sort of neck exercises you do for that purpose?
David Ito
The main one is just walking around in my helmet. Nod yes, nod no, while lying on my back and elevating my head, holding a plank while moving my head in various directions.
Guy Windsor
Okay. Does that help?
David Ito
Well, my neck feels stronger. Like I could definitely feel the burn the first time I did it.
Guy Windsor
Okay. Because yeah, I'm currently thinking about developing a neck strengthening routine to prevent, well not prevent, you can't prevent concussions. Shall we say, mitigate some of the some of the effects of concussion. Because there is some good evidence to suppose that particularly sort of fast twitch response in the muscles in the neck, if they are stronger when you get hit in the head, basically your body can stabilize it faster and so there is less damage to the brain. But I need a bit more research on it.
David Ito
I don't like seeing people having to stop doing this because of injuries. It's not necessary.
Guy Windsor
Yeah. And a lot of those injuries can be prevented with better rule sets,
David Ito
Better rule sets, and also training people to control their actions.
Guy Windsor
Yeah.
David Ito
I definitely notice that people tend to hit harder when they get tired.
Guy Windsor
Right. So if they were fitter, and had done their burpees before in the lead up to the tournament, then perhaps they wouldn't be so tired. So they perhaps wouldn't. It's probably not a good idea to have a fitness test before a tournament because that's not really fair. But I think maybe if someone was getting tired, judges were more keen on intervening and saying, look, you need to have a break. So it'd be perhaps bit more normal to take breaks if someone is getting tired, rather than at the moment, if your opponent gets tired, that's good for you, they are more likely to make mistakes or whatever. So the person who is fitter is not incentivised to give the person a break. But for safety purposes, it might be better if there was a culture of I don't want to fence you when you're tired. I want to fence you when you're at your best, take a rest. Do you see what I mean?
David Ito
Well, I just don't know how that works for most tournament organisers because they often have time constraints.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, exactly. I'm not suggesting making it as a serious suggestion for people organising tournaments because I can see it would be a nightmare to implement. But it's something that maybe we should think about.
David Ito
Yes. Anything that we can do to try to make this less dangerous for people is important because we want our friends to be able to play with us.
Guy Windsor
Exactly. Any parting remarks, anything you want to add?
David Ito
Oh, one thing I might add is going back to like the idea of the epee, shinai, longsword not being the same. You know what parry six is, in epee or foil? You palm up to the outside? False edge. The one thing that I've noticed with outside line parries is that when you do that palm up outside parry, circle six, because the epee doesn't sit perfectly in the centre of your hand when you go palm up it actually moves the blade more to the outside. So I started applying that with longsword when I do outside line covers with the long sword, I do it palm up like a parry six.
Guy Windsor
So do I. Always have done, not least because is explicit in the Italian tradition, Fiore and Vadi both, that rising and horizontal blows from the reverso side are done with the false edge. And so whenever you're parrying to your outside, you'll be using the false edge. So this business is like turning the true edge to parry to the outside like you would in for example second with an epee or seconda with a rapier, I barely ever do it with a longsword. It is almost invariably false edge. It is faster, cleaner. And it follows the text. So I'm entirely on your side on that one.
David Ito
I don't know why people do outside line parries with their true edge in longsword when you could just use the false edge because much like an epee, it actually moves the blade a little bit further to the outside.
Guy Windsor
Yeah. And you don't have to cross your hands.
David Ito
Which is even better.
Guy Windsor
Yeah, I think we think alike on this and I hope the next time I get to Toronto we will get to fence a bit.
David Ito
That would be lovely.
Guy Windsor
Well thanks so much for joining me today, David. It's been lovely to see you again.
David Ito
Thank you so much, Guy.
