Sounds like you are landing toe first instead of heel first. To fix that try this trick when your knee heels. Find a hard wood or smooth floor surface, place a quarter on the ground. Now come on guard with your front heel on the quarter. Practice the lung by first lifting your toes and then kicking the heel forward, if you do this right the quarter will get launched across the floor with your heel leading the lunge. The leading heel should impact first and cause the impact shock to transfer through the leg with out stressing the knee as the foot rolls the shin forward in to the final lunge position. This also happens to be the fastest method for the lunge.
You have a slight miss understanding of RoW. It by the was originally implemented as a training technique in the small sword to promote learning to defended and counter. I trained epee, saber, foil, and coached foil.
Anyway the trick with right of way is to never let the opponent take it away. Sometimes this is easy some times it is hard. Ask your couch about the Remise, or continuation of the attack, it lets you follow the the first attack with another with out loosing right of way. If you lose RoW, you don't have to wait, just take it back. This can be done with either a parry-repost , beat, glissade, or if you are just flat faster recover and restrike before they can respond.
Interestingly, at the time I read this post last year, I hardly had any understanding of fencing.
Now, after a year of fencing épée and starting sabre as well, I think I can better grasp what you meant with regards to the RoW.
Even though it makes for ruleset which are unrealistic, I am starting to see how it makes sense to ingrain these reflexes, because it teaches :
- to parry and riposte (instead of just thrusting at the same time and hoping to land first)
- to get the opponent's blade out of the way before striking either by battuta or by binding
Now obviously this is valid when you don't have the RoW and may posibly teach you much better to hit without getting hit, which is closer to a duel.
On the other hand I have observed some anti-combative behaviour, like when one fencer has RoW and just advances towards his opponent while "hiding" his blade just because he has RoW and cannot lose a point if the opponent does not contact his blade.
Anyways, I am sure that even as an épée fencer, this mindset will improve my overall understanding of fencing.
BTW I am noticing that as I am improving and being more careful, I tend to search contact with the blade before striking (like battuta to the bottom followed up with a thrust on the forearm) anyways. So I guess that RoW makes more sense as you start refining your game.
While my speed was good enough to beat other noobs when I started, I have had to evolve, because almost all the noobs quit and the couples ones remaining (like 2 out of 15) are already competing and training 4x / week, thereby becoming more proficient at a scary pace. The rest of the people I fence with all have years or decades of experience.So I can't pull off the sh1t I was pulling at first, that is relying overwhelmingly on speed and aggression.
Ok, / diary.