Minimalist and clean looking COMP5 (V2) build for Nick, who’s looking to build his championship stroke and has been working hard on his competition distance cast 🙂
If you are curious about competition distance techniques there is a page and some helpful videos in the Sexyloops Masterclass: https://www.sexyloops.com/flycast/competition-distance-cast/
Comp distance is actually a great way of working on casting technique in general, irrespective of whether you compete or not. In particular, it involves using the body effectively, straight tracking, high line speed, late (properly timed) force application and excellent timing. What I’ve always liked about it, is that the improvements are clearly measurable.
In this regards it’s not unlike cycling sport! Yesterday I took a FTP test here on the boat (Functional Threshold Power) and was pleased to find that my FTP has risen from 200 (last checked) to 244. It’s not exactly trained athlete status – and it was 6 months since I last checked (should do so every 6 weeks!) – but it’s a good improvement and puts me up a Zwift racing category. Casting down the tape measure does exactly the same thing for me, and tells me if my technique is improving. Also it’s fun and most of the people involved are actually a little bit mad.
Anyway I digress :p This was actually our last HT10 blank in stock. We have a new shipment of blanks arriving in the next two days. Which is excellent because this happens to be a very popular rod at the moment 🙂
As a comp 5 distance tool, what I like about it is that it is both light and fast, yet has feel even with the light line (obviously it’s a different sort of feel to having a 10WT line through the rings!). I believe it’s because it has this feel, that it is quite easy to adjust the stroke on the pickup cast, keeping the loop under control. This is important because if you can’t set the first backcast properly, then you are always going to struggle to control the later casts. I always use pull-back to set up this first back loop. Ok… here’s a page on Pull-Back https://www.sexyloops.com/flycast/pull-back/ (This is not a comp technique, but it is slightly advanced and well worth learning once your stroke is consistently good!).
I always go on “three” by the way. Pickup, forward cast, backcast, forward, backcast, Launch! This is the machine-gun approach I favour and I breathe around it. In – hold – out – in – hold – out! That way I’m exhaling on the Launch and not hyperventilating (or for that matter not breathing at all) during the casting sequence.
I can’t wait to see how Nick finds his new rod! I’m very curious to see how quickly he develops his stroke around it and it will be great to cast together at the World Championships 🙂
I’m on the lake full-time now but you can always get hold of me on paul@sexyloops.com
Cheers, Paul