Tracy&James | Wednesday, 21 August 2024
Last weekend we held the BFCC fly casting event in Derbyshire, very close to the pretty town of Bakewell. The day before the casting event, we had planned to go fishing on the river Wye, however as I wasn't very well in the morning we decided to go for a leisurely stroll around Bakewell instead. Obviously this meant mainly walking along the river bank to check out the fish. There are also several bridges where people stand and throw food into the river for the ducks and the humongous fish. We were amazed by the size of the trout – both browns and rainbows – but what got our attention was the size of the grayling and the fact that they rose to take food near the surface. It was intriguing to watch the fish behaviour taking this unnatural food, however we also saw lots of flies and rises to naturals. Bakewell has an amazing array of shops and places to get coffee and cakes – so of course we did sample some sugary desserts with a cuppa.
The weather on the day of the event was noticeably calm but thankfully dry and warm. This location is in a valley and surrounded by trees so we knew this weather would result in changeable breezes and cause the distance competition events to become a bit of a lottery. However this weather was perfect for our instructors who were kept busy for the whole day and they even roped in a few local instructors, who happened to come along, to help out and provide instruction. The feedback from those being taught was excellent as always and it was great to see several females have beginner lessons, particularly one young lady who by the end of the day was double hauling. She came with one of our top competition casters so I know she's going to get lots more advice and hopefully we'll see her at future events. Such individuals make the instructors' day.
The competition ran slowly during the whole day starting with accuracy where Nick only beat myself and James by one point. The rest of the distance events were run in order of the double handed ones first, then the shooting head ones, followed by the trout distance ones. James won four of the events and Nick three and he came close to beating James on the overall score, so hopefully he can work on this for the next event he comes to. It was great to have several people enter the comps after instruction and for the first time in quite a while we held a B100 category in the trout distance events. The B100 is for new people who haven't previously entered the competitions and have yet to cast above 100ft. This category was created to encourage new casters to have a go at the comps and compete with other newbies rather than the more experienced casters. However the main aim of these comps is to record your own results to compare against for future events as you improve following attendance at more BFCC days and from practice following the advice from the instructors.
During the BFCC day, it was great to catch up with one of the members of the UK team who the next day was travelling to Sweden to compete in the World Championships. He provided lots of advice to other attendees about double-handed casting and worked hard on improving his accuracy. James and I are currently watching the results of the Worlds as they are reported on. They have held the accuracy and salmon overhead qualifications already and well done to everyone who competed.
The event is being held on a lovely location next to a beach and the competitors have been posting great photos of the seaside. It appears to be quite calm which is great for the accuracy but maybe not so for the distance events. For the distance comps, the entrants cast twice so they have an opportunity to improve and I assume this is the organisers way of trying to remove the 'wind lottery' aspect that has been a problem with previous comps – and is frequently an issue with BFCC meetings. I remember we did this once at a Jersey BFCC event, though this was mainly due to the low number of entrants so we had plenty of time. For well attended competitions this might not be so easy for us to co-ordinate within daylight hours.
The next events are Trout Distance and Sea-Trout Distance on Wednesday, then Spey 15ft on Thursday with the final and Spey 18ft on Friday plus the final. The finals from the trout events and salmon overhead will be held on Saturday. Good luck to those yet to compete.
We are also preparing for our next BFCC meeting – in Jersey on the Channel Islands. There's a few of us going so it should be a great social and hopefully we'll be able to do some fishing too. We always get treated well by the Jersey fishers and we are looking forward to catching up with them all. James and I are staying for a few extra days after the event to do some sight-seeing, so it'll be a lovely holiday for us.
Whatever you are doing this week or weekend, enjoy and tight-lines,
Cheers
Tracy