In the real world: I would call hacking away at stone with a sword, a waste of a sword.

In The Witcher: I'd say going Darth Vader on a golem is damned exhausting. Properly positioned up and buffed, using a mixture of sword strikes and signs took forever to fight The Sentry.

Actually, if I had known the pylons would remain interactible during the battle, I probably would have tried the lightening trick the wiki mentions.