Hosted by Pflug Fighters Norfolk

For anyone in historical fencing, Swedish tournament legend Axel Pettersson needs no introduction. We’ve heard the name since our first longsword lesson, we’ve seen the videos, we’ve seen him winning the major events and we know we’re in for a treat. And yet, how good an instructor Axel actually is, isn’t as talked about as it should.



I’m still blown away by how good the seminar was!

A big thank you to Ben Grief from Pflug Fighters Norfolk for organising it and for pulling off a successful week-end of longsword full immersion.

Axel started off with a warm up based on wrestling (I quote him, “I see no difference between wrestling and historical fencing, wrestling training is so beneficial to your fencing.”) and a lot of excellent drilling followed, first without sword to train distance and timing management, then sword in hand. The teaching was structured so well, every drill linked to the following. Over two days, we practiced solo drills, pair drills, flow drills focused on the use of long edge and short edge, parries, faints, footwork, tactics, coached sparring, feedback, mental game, cross training and stretching and surely I’m not mentioning all. My notes by now have reached the size of a mini treatise, just saying. I attended many events and seminars so far but this was the first with one instructor in particular. With his in depth knowledge of the sources and his understanding of body mechanics, Axel taught for about 6 hours a day keeping everybody’s attention high and without ever losing his positive attitude and his smile, chapeau!



Big fan of one-on-one learning as I am and knowing Axel’s been keen on it recently, I was delighted I could schedule some 20 intense precious minutes of private tuition with him and I recommend it. One on one time is invaluable, focused on you and your fencing only. Gold.

Along with the nice folk from the organising club, historical fencers from London, Cambridge, Bristol, Bath, Brighton and as far as North Wales came to East Anglia to attend the seminar, and everybody was friendly and keen on training. Fantastic crowd.

A longsword competition with shiny prizes accompanied the seminar, and fourteen fencers, including me, took part. All five Waterloo Sparring Group regulars at the event competed and did well and I ended up facing my instructor in the final. He deservedly won taking first place, while I got my first silver (bronze and gold before, so that’s a first) and a beautiful shiny Regenyei messer as prize.



That makes it my second medal in an open longsword comp, after I got bronze in Dublin last summer. Not bad for little old me and I’m especially pleased with the feedback I got from my instructor after the semifinal. It was interesting though that while in the rest of the tournament my competitor hat was well on my head, in the final against my instructor I felt very much the student again and that affected my performance negatively. But it’s all experience points gained and something more to watch out for the next time.

Above: The Koning gloves, finally a chance to have a look at and a feel for these new great gloves designed and produced by Axel Petterson and Anders Linnard.

It all sounds too good to be true but the week-end really exceeded my expectations, and they were high to begin with. Apart from what I got out of it technically, a lot of what Axel said throughout the hours of training reinforced both my idea that my instincts regarding sword fighting are correct and my resolution to trust them more. He touched on many relevant points: the importance of cross training, strength training, wrestling as the mother of all fighting, sparring mindset and competition mindset, feedback (how to give it, how to take it) and more, including what every longsword fencer knows in their heart of hearts, even if some are still in denial: yes, the High Vom Tag guard is totally sexy!

All pictures courtesy of Ben Grief except the last two. Nope, didn’t forget to take an Axel selfie!