Paul Arden | Tuesday, 17 January 2023
This time next week I’ll be back in Malaysia. The Rocket has a new floor. I arrive on Chinese New Year, not exactly perfect timing but this event changes dates every year and only Chinese astrologists actually know when it might or might not occur, and no one tells me until I’ve made other plans! No wonder the flights were cheap.
It’s been nice. Lovely to see my family which is why I came. It’s been cold. Of course that’s relative. But my feet are my thermometers (unlike Ronan, who uses something else) and they’ve been telling me it’s cold now for over three weeks. Too cold for triathlon training. Hmmm some catching up to be done there.
We had a small casting gathering last weekend. Mark Stoats, Lee Master Sexyloops Rod Builder and Nick Moore from the FPs. Really great to catch up with these lads. Nick is an outstanding caster. Very, very tidy indeed. Potential world champion.
It was actually nice to cast down the tape and at the rings again. It’s been a very long time indeed since I’ve done this and my distance delivery was, to put it mildly, all over the place :))) But that’s to be expected. Curiously my accuracy was reasonably good and that’s not through accuracy training, but Snakehead fishing.
I do miss having a circle of serous casting friends around me. I did try to set such a thing up in Malaysia a few times but with little success. It’s one thing to build the skill levels but quite another to build the interest. Consequently my casting training isn’t launching the 5WT or hitting targets; it’s about making shots. That’s currently what I’m best at and need to be fishing-wise.
But hey, you Malaysians out there; if you want to get together and get serious about your casting then I am interested. The next World Championships will be in Sweden next year and Ashly and I will be representing Malaysia and Mars respectively. It would be nice to sport a bigger field. You can be competitive in 18 months.
I did have a very interesting conversation with Mark while he was here. I have huge respect for Mark. He’s a very smart man. He’s embroiled in instructor associations’ knitting activities. And he’s right in what he says. (As was I when I was doing my Zorro bit too incidentally). I thought it was a generation thing but apparently not.
I’m going to do something in this department again too some day. Probably. What the associations all lack is teaching structure. And from my experience a) it’s impossible to change associations more than an inch at a time and b) the amount of effort expended trying to do so is far better utilised elsewhere.
Talking of which, Zoom lessons are back. I currently have two available spots. These are 12 lesson courses for 700USD.
Can’t wait to put my feet back in 32 degrees water again. Ice swims? Forget it!!!
Have a great week. Next week back in the tropics. That’s where my feet belong.
Cheers, Paul
POD Nick's HT10 and Hardy Reel. Here I'm being very careful not to get the reel dirty while Lee is directs the other end of the operation.
Nick's arrived.
Paul pushing the pink casting wheelbarrow, Lee carrying a suitcase, Stoats carries my contribution.
It's all abuut to happen... there may be a video!