"Love is full of anxious fears."

-Ovid

Warning: Woe-is-me-isms ahead...

Last weekend was a pretty awesome weekend for our little band of epeeists. Though I could not attend, the club hosted what turned out to be a big A2 tournament. Two of my teammates earned two new awesome ratings: a B and a C. Obviously, our new coach's methods are working out...and how!

But I will admit to you, forgiving audience that you are, that after last Monday's night practice I was a little pensive. Fencing, for me, has never been solely about competition or about getting the highest rating possible. I try to make competitions an objective measure of how I'm progressing my skills. Of course I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to get that next rating or place in the top X of any given tournament. But that's not necessarily what I'm thinking about at practice.

And it seems that now my mindset has fallen out of step with the overall tone of practice. I do really love pushing myself in the conditioning exercises and trying to perfect my form in blade and footwork drills but these, along with very focused and competitive bouting, leave little room for free, fun fencing. Feels like these days every time I step on the strip at practice I am accompanied by little anxious fears that my performance in that bout is critical to my viability as an epeeist. I also feel like I get frustrated more easily than I did a few months ago and that I take the losses harder.

And...that's all I really had to get off my chest. Please feel free to chalk this entire post up to female fickleness. What was I wishing for last year? I'm guessing it was a devoted coach and more direction for practices. Yeah.