The
"Magic Switch", world's most efficient
and elegant way of switch casting.
|
Important!
On the following pages you will
not find
any explanations how to perform well known casts. This has been done by several
authors and can be read in their books. I will not warm up old things here, but
only put new or not very well known things
as well as my developments onto these pages.
|
 |
|
Flycasting today
... some thoughts about the most
elegant and gentle way of fishing
Fly
casting has been analysed
quite well especially within the
last 40 years. This means that only very few new things will be added to our
knowledge about this subject in the next years and decades. In Europe we have reached
a very high level which will only allow very little further developement,
except the tackle would change dramatically. But we have to go on.
This forward movement will be determind by the development of
new fishing tackle and vice versa. There is also
still a
lot of space inbetween the different techniques which can be filled. Every
single little piece of individuality will make the developement continue. A
reduction to only one stile is conterproductive, because it stops the possible
enlargement of our flycasting horizon and does not regard the physical
differences of our students. New materials used in our tackle and last but not
least the different characters of our waters demand a style that is adapted to
the situation.
What
does this mean for every single one of us?
We have to develop our own but biomechanically
correct style of casting which is adapted to our physical abilities and
shows the best results for us. By
doing this, stay open minded, to everything that is new,
choose, but don't drop your own ideas if you find out that they will help you to
improve. Be careful, open your eyes, try to see what makes
sense and what is just show to attract attention! Perfection means reducing
power and movements by getting still the same optimal results.
G. Feuerstein
Present tendencies in fly
casting
Mel Krieger(†) and G. Feuerstein
in USA
Europe:
There have not been too many new things appearing on the flycasting
stage in Central Europe in the last years. From time to time "new" casts which
are already known are presented by someone else under a new name.
Regardless to say, that a lot of things have already existed in other people's
heads before or had perhaps already been practiced, but never been published.
However, all these discussions are just a waste of time. Shouldn't we all just
try to push the development of flycasting foreward regardless of the person who
has found out something new? Shouldn't we -without any wrong pride- honor the
work of those pioneers who
have and still do develop techniques that help to make fly fishing more
effective or more enjoyable? We all should try to give our students the best
help to improve their skills.
In Central Europe Europe the
"air casts"
-as I call them- had been well analysed, perfected and published which was first of all the work
of people like Charles Ritz and
Hans Gebetsroither,
whose casting style(oval
casting - in the USA misleadingly called Belgian Cast) and theories had been slightly modified after his death by
several fly casters.
Roberto Pragliola from Italy has gone new ways with his fly
fishing school in using special high speed techniques (TLT
technique) for
dry flies with very light tackle. In
my opinion TLT is the most effective technique for dry fly (only for dries and
tiny nymphs) fishing. Some of the
"water casts" (term
which I created some years ago for the different
roll, Spey and switch casts)
were not that well
known on the continent and more or less unknown in the United
States in the early nineties.
|
A lot of these trick casts
were developed by
Göran Andersson from Sweden who has
also developed the IMHO most
effective style for two handed rods
- the so called
Underhand
Technique
- which is performed
mainly with shooting heads and can be used for single hand rods, too.
The Underhand Technique is more and more "misused" by
spey casters who just call it modern spey casting instead of underhand
casting although spey casting
was a very unique and fabulous technique developed for casting the very
soft(slow) and long two handed rods used at the wide Scottish Salmon
rivers. This misuse of wrong terms mainly because of business reasons has
lead to a lot of confusion among fly fishermen around the world. Some other techniques (Snake and Turbot Roll Casts,
...) come
from U.K. and have been developed by
Simon Gawesworth
in the early eighties. Not to forget Michael Evans
who has contributed a lot to the developement
in two handed casting,
too. |
 |
The flycasting instructor scenery in Europe is
meanwhile very
well connected through the
EFFA Flycasting Instructor Programme,
world's best but also toughest flycasting instructor programme and intends to develope new and better teaching methods which will help to make
their flycasting classes even more efficient. The
EFFA Flycasting Instructor Program is a very useful mean to
make sure that only good methods and techniques are used not only to keep the
casting level in Europe high but even to improve it.
|
Fly Casting demo with Charles
Jardine(U.K.) in the States |
 |
My little contribution
to this development:
GF Flycast Design
I have been fishing
since my early childhood and if you would ask me what I like more, fishing or
fly casting, you will immediately get the answer: "Fishing, of course!" I am a
fisherman and the fish I could not get were the motivation for my longlasting
trainings on the lawn and in the gym. During these year long exercises I was
developping several new casts and technical variations which I spread among the
fly fishers around the world in dozens of shows and special fly fishing events
and of course in my courses and especially the instructor training courses. In
those courses I have taught some of the best instructors of present times
which helped to spread these new casts
into all corners of the fly fishing world within a relatively short time.
I want to explain you several casts/technical
improvements now, which
I have developped in the last decades and which show
great advantage in special situations. They have meanwhile
been
published
in several books and videos.
The GF Upstream Pick Up(meanwhile aka Snap-T/Snap-Z/Circle
Cast) are some
of my oldest casts but only became popular after teaching them in
the States in 2000 to some enthusiastic instructors from Calgary.
Some of the others I developed in the early nineties.
I
showed them first officially in summer 1995 at the FFF-Conclave in Livingston/Montana(USA) while
casting with Lefty Kreh. After that I demonstrated them in Swalmen (NL, in 1995)
at the Chatsworth Angling Fair (GB, 1996), at the Danish Fly Festival in
Kolding(DK, 1997) and at Fly Fair (NL, 1998)
and
within the last decade at
dozens of
shows in Europe the USA
and even in Russia.
In the last years I have
optimized and fine tuned some casts and made them more effective. It was always
my aim to control the energy by optimizing the technique
instead of being or becoming as slave of it. At present time there are movements
within the fly fishing scene which put the use of maximum power in the centre.
For me fly fishing is anything else but using maximum power and touching the ground
with line and fly during the false casts several times just to cast some meters
more. This belongs to tournament distance casting but should not become some sort of
a mainstream in fly fishing. It is to decide well what can be used at the water
and what not and the things should not be mixed up. At least what I am concerned
fly fishing and the casts I use at the water will always be done in an elegant way with
a harmonic, obviously powerless but nevertheless very effective technique and I
will only forward useful fly fishing techniques to my international clientele and the fans of
energy control.
My revolutionary backhand
hauling technique (based on my
more efficient double haul
technique for the basic cast) allows better
loading of the rod, smaller loops and much longer casting
distances.
Well known instructors all around the world have confirmed the enormous
efficiency of this cast and many of them use it now and have
dramatically improved their off shoulder casting. The rod loads much
better and the harmony between rod hand and line hand is optimized.
This makes your flyline fly and fly and fly...
>>
video
GF
Vertical Bow Cast
A vertical Air Mend/Bow Cast for nymph fishers.
A trick cast only for specialists which makes the nymph
sink much faster and easier!
The "Dunker"
This
is my improved high speed Tuck Cast which makes the nymph sink very fast. It
outcompetes all other variations of tuck casts becauses the rod tip movement is
optimized to get the highest speed of the nymph when it snaps through the water
surface.
>>
video
The most elegant and
efficient way of Switch Casting. To be seen on the DVD of the special edition 20
of Fisch & Fang " So wirft man die Fliege" on chapter 5 "How professionals cast".
First published in Sedge and Mayfly in 2005 and latest publication was in
Russia's leading fly fishing magazine in 2008.
>>
video
GF Upstream Pick Up (also known as
Snap-T, Snap Cast, C-Spey)
A trick cast for the nymph fisher, which I have
created in the eighties, that allows a long distance presentation in
situations where there is not much space for common
casting techniques. Since I have
demonstrated this technique in the States one of my students gave it the name
Snap-T. This cast is meanwhile used world-wide for fishing with two handed rods.
>>
video
GF airalized Snap-T for
single and two handed rods (aka
Snap-Z)
A switch cast for special situations
which allows to carry more line in the air (larger D-loop) and get a deeper
loading of the rod.
>>
Snap-Z video(single
hand rod) >>
Snap-Z video(double hand rod)
Two handed fly casting(videos)
|
