Fluidity at the pell

Because I have a pell in my backyard, every once in a while I'll come up with a new idea on how to practice with it. The other night, I was whacking away but it was hot, I was tired after work, blah blah blah. Short story: I did want to get some practice in, but not completely exhaust myself physically with rapid-fire work or mentally with approach/non-telegraph-attack work. So I just stood in front of the thing and cut at it, half-speed or slower. Yes, this is a drill born out of relative laziness but as I continued doing it, I realize that there was more than enough to work on. Here's what I was doing, specifically:

- Stand at striking distance from the pell.
- Strike a 1-2 combination of Oberhau and/or Unterhau.* For example, Oberhau from right then Unterhau from left ; or Unterhau from left then Unterhau from right; or Oberhau from left then Unterhau from left. You get the point. Pick a pair and repeat, repeat, repeat for a while before you pick another pair.
- Focus on fluidity of movement, connection between sword and hips.
- Focus on efficiency of movement, i.e. not letting the sword go on unnecessarily large arcs; but be honest with yourself—you probably can't effect a "real" cut with just a flick of the wrists (I know I can't).
- Focus on the entirety of your upper body: are you turning so much that your shoulder is exposed? is your elbow sticking out? are you cutting to your center? etc.

* Yes, I know there are other cuts to be practiced too. Zwerch and Krump I left out specifically because I didn't feel like adding any footwork into the mix. Also consider the fact that you can do combinations of 3, 4, or no combination but a 'random' assault. But by restricting and focusing on less, it's actually easier to pay better attention to the nitty-gritty details.

Also, since Mike hasn't said it himself in a while: "Slow is smooth; smooth is fast."

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EDIT: Another thing to think about is grip (looser until point of impact); this however is a bit artificial, since you have to release sooner (because the sword is not passing through the pell). Test-cutting is obviously a better method of refining this, but it still bears keeping in mind.