Went to the Saturday epee lesson for the first time. This is a class that Maître Leon Auriol (the founder Salle Auriol) started a couple weeks prior. The class started with eight students, but was now down to 3 (probably because a major tournament is coming up). Bernard, a fencer that I've fenced regularly on Monday nights, was one of the students. I've been wanting to take a lesson from Leon since I started, but felt that I wasn't good enough yet to warrant a lesson from him. Actually, I took my first fencing lessons from Leon back at the University of Washington in 1990. Now that I'm at a point where I can appreciate his guidance, I'm honored to be back under his keen eye.
Leon was giving a private lesson to a French woman when I arrived. Its been great getting lessons from Garik in Russian, but listening to Leon give a lesson in French was also appealing. I hope I can some point take lessons in French since, as with Garik, its easier for the instructor to communicate in their native language. Not that they can't communicate in English, but their emotion, intonation and general observations are much more prevalent in their native tongue. It turns out that Leon originally came to America to train our Olympic pentathletes and has been a part of most of the Olympic, Goodwill and World cup games for most of his life (he is 72 now). Leon is about 5'6" or so, gray hair, stocky. He smiles a lot, has a great sense of humor and has that classic French under-his-breah laugh. He's definitely one of those people that you want to please you feel priviledged when he notices you. During our drills, he paid a lot of special attention to me, particularly in my point control. I hope this means that he is truly engaged in me becoming a pentathlete (as opposed to an instructor that might give you a lesson simply because you're willing to pay for it). The class went really well and it was clear that I do need a lot of work on point control, as well as more attention to compound attacks. Bernard was especially patient with me.
In between the drills and the open fencing portion of the class, Leon took a moment to fill his wine glass. Now that's the kind of coach I like!
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