Nick and I made a video last week of the fly casting drills commonly used in the first lesson for our Intermediate Level fly casters. What is an intermediate level flycaster? Basically where many casters who practise will get to their own over time without coaching and then plateau. Which is also where most of my students come in for lessons. They may have been fishing for 15 or 50 years and have a decent fishing cast but now want to be better.

These are really just separate drills without the coaching, for students to study after the lesson. We don’t include them all necessarily. And depending on the student, others may be appropriate. These are however very commonly given during the lesson. This first lesson involves accuracy casting to targets, as well as distance casting and finally an analysis of the Double Haul.

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Life is packed. Work, kids, and a World Cup on at all the wrong hours. Somewhere in there I got out and practised, which lately feels like the win in itself. Spey casting, and the snakehead shot. Fast fish, one movement, line picked up off the water and stuck out there before the moment's gone. You only just see them and then it's done. Takes a bit of working out.

Something that inspired the way I practise this week was a thread I was reading on the board. The point made, and it stuck with me, was that practising the cast without accuracy misses the point. Easy to drift into. You stand at the park throwing loops, they look nice, they go a fair way, and you feel like you've done something. But pretty loops that land nowhere in particular aren't fishing. So I put out the hoops and made myself score it. That's something Paul has been encouraging me to do, but it's not as much fun as sending a long cast - well, maybe that's about my attitude and it needs adjusting!

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I'm currently suffering from a very mild case of tennis elbow which I stupidly brought about during the weekend at the Harrogate Country Sports Show. It's not bad enough to give me much in the way of discomfort, however I know that it could progress to being troublesome if I kept up my normal routine of casting practice. As such, I haven't picked up a rod since the show packed up on the Sunday.

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You’ve had enough saltwater stuff for a while so it’s hedgehogs this week. Not sedgehogs, although I will mention them. These are real multifunction flies that I wouldn’t be without for still water.

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I almost forgot to write a FP for today. It’s been a crazy week and a crazy day. The day started quite good with some casting practice and on my way home that did change drastically. Outside the street door to my apartment building I did see a cat that didn’t look very well. Not well at all. It was just lying there very still and looking like it was gasping for air. So I felt that I needed to do something.

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Graeme Hird dropped an interesting YouTube video last week about roll casts and anchors. As I’m understanding it the rearward pull on the anchor does not occur until after the rod unloads and the loop is formed. What impressed me the most was watching the loops. What's going on? What is it that creates a virtual pulley - changing the line’s direction and transmitting tension? Why does the form of the loop hold as it eats the fly leg and lengthens the rod leg? Is there an inherent stability to a well formed, well tended loop or is the loop a delicate wraith, only made substantial by the application of a well-learned skill? This virtual pulley is where momentum meets the wave form. It’s like the missing link between relativity and quantum physics (forgive me, physicists. I’m just an old engineer). 

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