Solo training is the secret behind all truly excellent martial artists’ accomplishments. All world class sword people and martial artists spend much of their training time on solo training.

If you live miles away from the nearest fellow martial artist, don’t worry, this course does not require training partners. Instead we cover everything you can reasonably do alone to improve your swordsmanship skills.

If you have regular access to a school or training partners, you can still dramatically up your game by incorporating intelligent solo training into your schedule. This course will teach you how.

On this course you will learn ways of developing your mind, your body, and your technical skills, no matter what your starting point is. From absolute beginner to senior martial artist, we have you covered.

The Solo Training course includes these standalone courses:

• Meditation for Martial Artists This course covers four different kinds of meditation, aimed at improving your state of mind and making you a better martial artist.
• Fundamentals: Breathing This course will teach you how to breathe properly, and how to develop anaerobic and aerobic fitness without injuring yourself.
• Fundamentals: Footwork This course will teach you how to move like a martial artist, whatever style you wish to practice.
• Recreating Historical Swordsmanship from Historical Sources This course will teach you how to study the sources and create useful training syllabi from them. Most of such work can indeed be done alone.

COURSE CURRICULUM

Solo Training

Preview

Welcome. Please start here. (4:36)

Preview

Creating a Daily Practice (10:43)

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Planning your training: days, weeks, months, years (13:43)

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Creating solo forms (18:24)

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Handling Drills introduction (8:07)

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Striking drills introduction (7:50)

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The Pell (4:27)

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Point control basics (7:43)

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Conditioning: Stick drills (20:02)

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Improvised training tools (21:11)

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Training with clubs (29:24)

Longsword Handling Drills and Forms

Preview

Longsword Handling Drills (18:10)

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The Longsword Syllabus Form (8:13)

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Longsword: the pell (6:23)

Rapier Handling Drills and Forms

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Rapier Form (8:28)

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Rapier: the pell (5:18)

The Spear

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Spear class (12:44)

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Spear Form (4:23)

Sharp Swords and Cutting

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Resources (start here for this section) (35:59)

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How to sharpen a sword (18:52)

I.33 Sword and Buckler

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I.33 Sword and Buckler Solo class (18:01)

Smallsword

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Smallsword solo training class (19:50)

Wrestling- with Jessica Finley

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Welcome and Warm-Up (10:12)

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Falling (14:49)

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Mat Exercises (8:06)

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Footwork (10:42)

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Training with the Dummy (11:09)

Bolognese Swordsmanship, with Gindi Wauchope

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1.1 Spada: introduction and basic blows (5:18)

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1.2 Spada: Guards and Blows (16:59)

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1.3 Spada: Additional Guards (3:07)

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1.4 Spada: Footwork (13:22)

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1.5 Spada: Moving through the Guards (6:40)

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2.1 Spada e Brocchiero: Introduction (18:17)

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2.2 Spada e Brocchiero: Blows (16:43)

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2.3 Spada e Brocchiero: Cutting Drill (9:18)

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2.4 Spada e Brocchiero: The Embellishment (6:07)

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3.1 Spada da due mani: Introduction (12:06)

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3.2 Spada da due mani: the key guards (13:33)

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3.3 Spada da due mani: first assault, parts 1-4 (20:50)

Cross-training: Pilates!

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Pilates Basic Mat demonstration (9:02)

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Guy failing to do the Pilates Basic Mat routine (9:40)

Train Along video

Preview

Morning Warm-up sessions (1192:43)