Michal Duzynski | Saturday, 16 April 2022
Many times I hear fly fisherman saying that what they see as Distance Competition Casting style is a hard work and it is only good on the grass, but it is not suitable for real fly fishing situation as there is too much body movements involved, and too much of everything.
Of course this type of casting style is not suitable for every fishing situation when we want to cast far and present our fly at distance, and I know that, but in Saltwater Fly Fishing applications, or fishing in a lake when you have clear space behind your back this way of casting is perfect especially with bigger, heavier flies.
Some like to use "constant tension " cast AKA "Belgium Cast", but as I don't use this cast much, I will focus on 170 style that is used a lot in competition casting.
With 170 style we start with wide, open loop, but when your power application is right, and your haul timing is right "loop morph" will occur when the energy/momentum in the line will pull the wide, open loop and narrows it during its back-upwards propagation. This loop morphing happens on the back cast as well as on forward cast.
Before loop morph starts there is something called a " bouncing bomb " this is when after a wide casting stroke in 170 style (mostly on the back cast ) a part of the rod leg of the loop touches a surface behind you and bounces of it.
I came with the idea of this FP, after watching my recent video during imaginary Saltwater Fly Fishing trip. In the slow mo part you can see perfect example of bouncing bomb on the back cast where the line touches the water and then goes up.
Here is why I think Competition Casting style is useful in fly fishing when looking for this extra few feet of distance:
- with open stroke like presented at 170 style, there is less risk to hit the tip of your rod with a fly as we aim for initial open loop
- as we look for a tight loop, especially in windy situations, after (mentioned earlier 170 style stroke) loop morph is very helpful when we look to punch that perfect back cast against the wind
- once executed correctly, after the bouncing bomb, there is less chances of the fly to tick
in the video I'm using a line with 30'head, the idea is that if you have a little bit of overhang with that line and shoot, the rest will follow. Well, not exactly. You really need to have some line in the air in order to reach far
(propper shooting heads with mono running line are a bit different). If you practice distance casting competition style and line carry you will learn how to keep tension in the loop with a lot of line outside the rod tip and at the same time how to deal with overhang and that is very useful in fishing situationsback cast delivery is just a breeze
Competition style casting is very useful and it's worth to have it in your casting skills quiver.
P.s
Picture of the day, 8 years ago me and Paul went trough this road with my non 4x4 car, we made it using a special type of petrol, on the way back the day after we run out of the special petrol and got bogged!!!! :D :D :D
Tight Lines
Mike