Welcome to HROARR’s Training Pages

These pages will be focusing directly at more physical aspects of HEMA, on exercises, fitness and strength training, competition and gear.

You are of course all invited to publish your thoughts here!

Notice

The whole site is currently undergoing some radical changes aiming to improve how useful it is to the HEMA community. Please be patient while the work is completed.

The work is expected to take at least a week of fulltime work. Please consider supporting HROARR via Patreon.

Training News

Announcement: The “HEMA goes Public” event in Austria!

Dear fencing friends!, it is our pleasure to announce the "HEMA goes Public" event.   Last year, the project "HEMA in the Park" was launched for the first time in Austria and neighbouring countries (e.g. Germany, Hungary and Swizerland) to make our sword fencing...

New Sabre Event

... in one of the old fencing capitals of the world; Prague. This is a thing not to miss, and a chance to experience one of the most beautiul cities in the world, while meeting and training with some fantastic people. Sabreslash 2018  

read more

Training videos added

In an attempt at boosting both the training and the making of HEMA training and exercise videos, HROARR from now on will have numerous pages with videos for you to study. You can find them all under the Training section, under Training Videos.

read more

Training videos from the GFFG

The training we do at the Gothenburg Free Fencers Guild is divided according to different areas of focus, like e.g: footwork, body mechanics, weapon mechanics etc. For this we do not always carry weapons, instead stripping away anything but focus on the particular...

read more

Training Articles

Some thoughts on playing the victim

Some thoughts on playing the victim

A problem that we commonly encounter in the training and teaching of martial arts in general, is the issue of how the "loser" of the training exercise is supposed to act and behave. Some common issues shine through both in videos explaining the techniques, as well as...

read more
Fighting Successfully – Bridging The Gap Between Technique And Free Play

Fighting Successfully – Bridging The Gap Between Technique And Free Play

Did you ever face the situation that you trained a technique over and over, again and again and it just straight out refuses to come out during free play? Then you know the frustration if expectations and results don’t match.

Failing time and time again, because you can’t pull of what you should be able to doesn’t feel nice. It can be devastating and lead the most dedicated of us down a path of frustration. It can be a reason why people quit HEMA altogether.

read more
Fighting as a communicative skill

Fighting as a communicative skill

Since the elements described and explained up to now are properly just a beginning and primer from which all combat devices with the sword can be learned, it is necessary that before I derive some devices from them, first I should show in what...

read more
Review: Swordbag Liechtenauer

Review: Swordbag Liechtenauer

As much as I love the pioneering aspect of Historical Fencing some aspects of it have, at times, also been a bit frustrating as we have had little actual gear designed specifically for what we do, apart from... weapons, at least until rather late in the modern history...

read more
Review: SPES Dussack Waster

Review: SPES Dussack Waster

Given how important the dusack has been both in the fencing schools and tournaments, all the way from the very early 1500s up until Napoleon and the late 1700s, as well as on the battle fields as a weapon of war, it is somewhat surprising to see how comparatively...

read more
Free Fencing exercises

Free Fencing exercises

In our Meyer staff class we have been forced to develop methods that meet the simple fact that in staff fencing you are actually training with the actual sharp weapon and no protective gear will keep you safe from potentially crippling harm. Consequently we have...

read more

The Art of Control – Fechtschule Manifesto 2

Fencing with the Sword is nothing other than a discipline, wherein your force strives together with your sword  in placement so that one with the other, using care and agility, artfulness, delicacy and manliness, are at need the same both in strikes and in other...

read more
Art of Control (Fechtschule Manifesto) Part 1

Art of Control (Fechtschule Manifesto) Part 1

"Fencing with the Sword is nothing other than a discipline, wherein your force strives together with your sword in placement so that one with the other, using care and agility, artfulness, delicacy and manlyness, are at need the same both in strikes and in other...

read more
Review: SPES HEMA Jacket – Axel P model

Review: SPES HEMA Jacket – Axel P model

Looking at how the HEMA community looks today it is easy to forget how hard we have been working to get the attention of manufacturers hoping to get proper protective gear for our specific brand of martial arts. Only three years ago things were very different and...

read more
Review: Black Lance 5-finger HEMA Gloves

Review: Black Lance 5-finger HEMA Gloves

  One of the most elusive pieces of protective gear for HEMA, the Holy Grail if you will, is good protective gloves that offer enough dexterity to not hinder us in our fencing, when we try to apply the techniques that we struggle to learn in the fencing...

read more

Review: Where’s my fighting trousers?

"A telegram? Oh, dear. It seems someone has been "biting me"...? Fetch me my trousers at once! No, not those. Those are my time travel trousers. No, those are my tea trousers... That's it! Those ones. My fighting trousers! Ah, yeah!" When it comes to equipment HEMA...

read more
Meyer freeflow exercises

Meyer freeflow exercises

To begin with, just for clarification, this is not a typical article per se, but rather a text sorted under the Meyer Research Project, thus a more reasoning and speculative piece of text, posted for the sake of discussion and sharing of ideas concerning Meyer's...

read more
The Wreath or the Cash? On Tournament fighting

The Wreath or the Cash? On Tournament fighting

"Ey fåår Fächtare Krantz förn ändas Manlige Strijden. The Fighter shall not receive the wreath until the manly battle is ended (according to the rules)." -2 Tim 2:5. I sincerely consider tournament fighting to be vital to our efforts in recreating the...

read more

Rope drill for HEMA.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span> This is a very interesting exercise. The exercise is based on a boxing drill and can be expanded upon in...

read more
Review: Arms & Armor Fechterspiel Sword

Review: Arms & Armor Fechterspiel Sword

  Swordsmith: Arms & Armor Arms & Armor have been making swords for practice and sparring since the late 80’s which makes them a very old player in the HEMA field indeed. According to themselves, they felt that they originally had a hard time building a...

read more
Doing what we are told or what we are taught?

Doing what we are told or what we are taught?

Here's an old but still always relevant question for us HEMA practitioners to ask ourselves: When we read the old fencing treatises, should we only practice what we are told to do in the treatises or should we try to continue with the next step of playing with it and...

read more

The tools for the job

To understand the body mechanics involved in a technique we not only have to train our bodies so we are strong and agile enough, we also need to use tools that work together with our bodies in the appropriate manner. This may seem obvious but is really not and it can...

read more
Hands-on Preview: Pavel Moc Fechtschwert

Hands-on Preview: Pavel Moc Fechtschwert

HEMA has gone through a lot of progressive development in the last decade. The community is growing rapidly and bouts, tournaments and other forms of sportive sparring have become a standard part of practicing Kunst des Fechtens. The demand for weapons suitable both...

read more
Review: Norrlands waster by Plastsmeden

Review: Norrlands waster by Plastsmeden

The best longsword nylon wasters I have tried thus far were hand made by Pentti of GHFS. Unfortunately he no longer produces these, so they are near impossible to come by. However, the little known "Norrlandswastern" is the next in line and it offers quite unique...

read more
Review: Scimitars Fencing Shoes

Review: Scimitars Fencing Shoes

Finding good, suitable equipment for Hema is a problem we all wrestle with and there are few products aiming to fulfill our particular needs. I have been looking at shoes for handball, basketball, land hockey, boxing, wrestling, budo and regular sneakers, but none of...

read more

Search HROARR

Generic filters
Exact matches only
Filter by Custom Post Type
Posts
Pages
Downloads
Filter by Categories
Articles
Arms & Armour
Fencing Culture
Meyer Articles
Meyer Dagger
Meyer Dusack
Meyer Halben Stangen
Meyer longsword
Meyer Rappier
Teaching & training methods
Techniques & interpretation
Community Interviews
Community news
HROARR Announcements
IFHEMA
IFHEMA News
Instructors
News & Announcements
Notes
Research
Research articles
Research interviews
Research Methodology
Research News
Reviews
Bags
Books
Knives
Protective gear
Shoes & clothing
Swords
Study
Reading
Study Articles
Study Book reviews
Study Interviews
Study News
Teaching
Teaching Course plans
Teaching Curriculum
Teaching Interviews
Teaching Lesson plans
Teaching Methodology
Teaching News
Teaching Pedagogics
Teaching Syllabus
Teaching tips
Train
Reading
Psychology & Mentality
Training exercises
Training Gear reviews
Training Interviews
Training methods
Training News
Uncategorized
Workshops

Become a patron of HROARR!

Support HROARR on Patreon.com/hroarr

HROARR SUPPORTS

Fighters Against Racism

HEMA Companies

ASSOCIATED WITH

Acta Periodica Duellatorum