Tracy&James | Sunday, 5 February 2023
As James mentioned last week, we have commenced with our casting practice in readiness for the many competitions we will enter this year. I am quite pleased with my casting as I seem to have started well though I do have some technique improvements I need to make. One of these improvements involves bending my back to gain more drift that I am typically known for; though getting older makes this more tricky and from my recent practice sessions, I am finding it a little painful. I have started reviewing my pilates book to determine which exercises are more suitable to strengthening my lower back and sides. I already do yoga and other exercises, however I am expecting pilates to be more fruitful in helping my flexibility. I’m not really sure what the difference is between yoga and pilates as the movements seem very similar; I assume pilates just doesn’t have the mumbo-jumbo stuff attached to it…
Getting older is annoying but inevitable and I have modified our diets for the ‘nth’ year to eat more ‘plants’ and less meat, but generally be more healthy. (Though we both consider wine to be nutritious so that will obviously remain part of our diet.) It would be good if we could just spend all our time saltwater fishing as we always lose weight on those trips. It’s probably something to do with spending 7 or so hours wading and walking with only a few ginger-nut biscuits to keep us going. On our last trip we both lost around a stone and came back feeling much trimmer. However over Xmas, it was too easy to put some of that weight back on. Hence the focus on diet and keeping fit, though for the casting, I need to concentrate on the flexibility and strengthening exercises.
For the next month, I intend to do some ‘spine twists’, ‘the saw’ and ‘the mermaid’ movements, all designed to work on the muscles around the lower back, buttocks and abdomen. These are just a few of the intermediate pilates moves I will work on before moving to the more advanced stretches. James has offered to join me with these actions, so it will be interesting to see how he progresses as he too could do with working on his balance and strengthening key muscles he uses for casting. I do worry that when I tell him about the mermaid movement he’ll be wanting us to dress up like fish, so I’ll have to let him down gently. Increasing core strength is especially needed as he is developing his technique and certainly his ‘stepping’ would benefit from improving his balance. I know my casting technique certainly will.
We did a casting session today during which I had to limit my activities as my lower back was uncomfortable if I spent too long casting (I should probably stick to two false casts and a delivery). Hence I spent more time marking James and commenting on his practice session. I’m aiming to last much longer so I can work more on those improvements I need to make. Today was not a great distance casting day as we had high pressure and very little wind, but after our practice sessions, the stints casting against a tape had some pleasing results, albeit some wind would have been nice.
I’m currently developing the 2023 calendar of BFCC activities and also working on the details for the 3 Game Fairs that we will be supporting. I have just confirmed the Kent meeting in Willesborough for the 28th May. I’m still working on other venues and am waiting to be informed of available dates around the venues’ sporting activities so I should be able to announce further BFCC meetings soon.
Whatever you are doing this weekend, enjoy,
Tracy