Belegarth

Hey I was wondering if anyone has made practice dummy's I was thinking of putting one on my back porch and beating up on that when I get my weapons, myt dad agreed to attack me with my Kendo stick so that way I can learn to block.

I was thinking of stuffing some pillowcases with padding and sewing them together. Does anyone had similar designs or other designs? Pics will help.

IF you plan to do this, maybe give the dummy something to represent a shield, so as to grow accustomed to going around it.

Should I got for something like a tower? or maybe a teardrop. I've got some extra plywood I could pad up a little (Not like a real sheild but enough to not mess my sword up)

I don't know, but from my experience, most people use medium/tall tower shields, basically the large shield from Edhellen, I'm not sure though. Personally I use a small/medium round shield, so I'd just make a 28 x 40 or something, not really sure.

I have a practice dummy and a punching bag, I test my weapons out on them to see if I like the feel, but never really "trained" with them.

i have seen it done to just hold your shield, and try to hit the beam

have a base then a beam coming up then one coming at a 90 from the top of the beam and drill a hole at the end and put a dowle in the hole and put your shield straps on it, at try to hit the beam

hey look, directions to make a pell (fancy name for a practice target). This is also an extremely useful site with lots of how-to's . It is SCA centered but it's still really helpful. So yeah, have fun.

http://www.yamakaminari.com/Projects/Ka ... iwara.html

hey look, directions to make a pell (fancy name for a practice target). This is also an extremely useful site with lots of how-to's . It is SCA centered but it's still really helpful. So yeah, have fun.

http://www.yamakaminari.com/Projects/Ka ... iwara.html

I thought of making a pell, but I can't realy afford the wood right now. x.x And I don't have a lot of space, I live in a condo wo we have very limited practice area. I guess I could go to the park or something.

You could buy a couple of rolls of blue-foam, go to said park & wrap a torso sized tree with them.

Yahknow...That is a good idea. I think I will once I get my stuff, and get around to finishing up my garb.

I wonder...

How hard would it be to buy some burlap from Wal-Mart, make a human-shaped bag, stuff it with straw, and then hang it from a tree?

Maybe a good bit harder than say, tying some pillows or camp foam to a pole, but definitely cooler.

Go to goodwill....buy big jeans, big long sleeve shirt. Tie/duct tape/sew it together, hang it from a tree (not by the neck...thats just freaky to small children) and beat it. Just stuff it with whatever. Unfortunately it would be really hard to get one heavy enough to build much strength from beating on it. But it would be a good visual aid, IMHO opinion.

I sadly live in a SMALL home, with my girlfriend and her sister, and I don't even have room to house something that simple :S not sure what I am going to do for practice. I am hoping to get someone who will be really hardcorely interested in this game so I can just do one on one sparring..

in my experience, actually fighting people is a lot better than beating on a pell.

i agree

pells are mostly supposed to be used for building techniques that are harder to work on when going out and fighting at full speed. when first using them, take a hint from martial arts/boxing trainers: go slow and really exaggerate the movements, making sure everything is correct and accurate. only work on speed/power when you've got the timing and accuracy down.

a pretty good pell someone showed me was some large carpet scraps rolled into a kind of tube duct taped around a length of rope with an old bowling ball hanging from the bottom (pretty cheap--bowling ball=$5 at a thriftstore and the carpet can be dumpstered from a carpet store). hang that from a tree and it will move around erratically whenever you hit it. you can also hang stuff from it easily, like shields or weird swing arms that whip around and hit you in the face. good times. if you can, wear weights around your wrists or use heavier gear than normal when practicing.

this is how i was taught to practice (no matter what type of fighting i was practicing for) and it really pays off.

well, if you want to do that, just get a buddy to hold a sheild and you can practice shots on him and then trade and let him practice the shot while you hold the shield

this way, you both learn to throw and block the shot.

yeah, but pells work best when your buddies are too into "winning" to actually practice shots with you. i've run into that guy enough times in the last twenty years to know practice on a pell comes in pretty handy. plus, the developmental part of any martial art/sport (where people actually learn to do it well) is gawdawfully boring, so using a pell instead of subjecting someone else to the tedium of perfecting form/accuracy can be kind of useful as well.

i had to go that route when i was learning formally and i hated it, but the result has been well worth the hours of boredom.

I got a punching bag down in my basement, but I mostly use it just to build up muscle memory (mainly with my offhand, my offhand is terribly not used to wielding a weapon, and it sucks when i lose my main) and maybe try a few different wrap shots.

But yeah, I find practice with another person to be much more useful.

martial arts dummies work just fine