Casting School Days Casting School Days At one time, many years ago, her 'naming each step' of casting was unheard of, her technique and fly rod design for women groundbreaking. On this first night each student will tell her - with reverent tone - about the unique ways she has inspired them, and what brought us to this moment. As the week-end goes on, we will each struggle to interpret her techniques and 're-wire' ourselves – break our habits, think about the casting goal, practice, practice, practice relentlessly. She and her team of coaches (who have also traveled in from many other states - and both fear yet gently tease her!) will quietly and under the Joan Wulff watchful eye ('don't forget to tell them this…no, first try that') coach us until things begin to click. Day 2 we will be videotaped and cheer each other on (and learn we have more work to do!) At night we will hit the streams and see what we've learned! Our hands and arms will hurt ("you are doing it wrong!") and initially we will walk into the stream and revert to our pattern of old casting ways. But then the conscious awareness begins and at that point I say: "I will cast across this stream to that point – farther than I have before – and I will do it without wading out into the stream" and I do! And in disbelief I try it again, and again I cast where I want to! I feel a bit inspired. On the last day, we learn the double-haul and oh boy it looks like it's never going to come together. But after we tie everything together a few of the coaches separately sneak over to me, and they say "how does that cast feel to you?" or "so do you think you are doing a double-haul?" I realize that I don't feel like I am struggling, I am actually doing things I could not do earlier in the weekend, with a bit of ease. "That's because you are doing it correctly!" they say, and again, it's a great feeling. As Sunday winds down, the pouring rain begins. Joan brings us all onto
the porch but boots the coaches out into the rain to show us some fancy tricks
they've learned using Joan's techniques. Later Joan will cast with great ease
and then in that signature enormous distance - and all you can hear are the
gasps of "WOW". And finally, it's the "end of the day quiz" and we are ready to
leave. Only then does the guard come down, and tears well up in Joan's eyes as
she realizes another "school" of students are about to leave. She reminds us
that there are many stages in our fishing careers – and the later stages center
around not forgetting to give back and inspire others - so that fly fishing and
the streams we fish in will bring joy to generations of people to come. Joan
certainly has inspired me and I feel privileged to have spent the week-end at
her school (and with my great comrades and cabin-mates Judith and Jennifer!) My arm is tired and my mind is swimming with newly acquired vocabulary for the art of fly- casting: the power snap, drift, forward loading, stroke length, line pressure) As I watched the instructors gently and skillfully guide our struggles to unlearn bad habits and acquire improved techniques, I gained a new appreciation for what an art good casting truly is. I always have had a notion that practicing my cast could bring improvement. Now the notion is sharply focused, and I intend to work on accuracy, adaptability to adverse conditions, and distance. I intend to keep a rod strung, get up 20 minutes earlier, and following our morning walk, take the pooch to the park. While he plays with all his doggie friends, I will review the basics: forward cast, the roll cast, the single haul, the double haul, and shooting line. Bit by bit, I will add more specialized casts such as the curved cast, the circular cast and casting for greater distance. The ideal would be to have a follow-up session to check for backsliding. That would cure my lingering dread that old habits will creep back, obscuring the new muscle memory for efficiency and predictability. Once again I could be right back at that 35-foot "wall" for distance, trailing loops, ever surprising landings of my flies accompanied with tired, sore muscles. One line of defense is the purchase of Joan Wulff's video, Dynamics of Fly Casting, and the other is to spend time with fishing buddies who are willing to observe my cast. One gentleman in the class this weekend has taken it seven times. I guess that's another option: just keep going until it sticks. Had the woman from California made it this weekend, we would have been evenly divided, 10 men and 10 women. In addition to Joan Wulff (who clearly runs the show, over-seeing all the other instructors, frequently jumping in to explain something missed or under-stated, often moving to the floundering student to give hands-on assistance) there were 5 male instructors and one woman in training helping us. Joan Wulff sets a tone of serious intensity to cover the material. The rigor is tempered with humor, an easy camaraderie and a clearly evident love for the task at hand. The instructors were patient and encouraging. I found it particularly joyful to be in a setting where, even though out in the real world of fly fishing, ours is a male dominated sport, at the Joan Wulff School of Fly Fishing, the women do not take a back seat; front and forward, no nonsense. The class itinerary is rigorous, with a great emphasis on the basic mechanics required to make a good cast. In the event that you have that down pat, there are many "variations on the theme" to keep you interested and challenged. Toward the end of the second day, each of the instructors got their own rods and "performed" for us, each one choosing a favorite (and spectacular) cast. Each cast, explained and executed for a particular purpose, made our jaws drop. What dropped my jaw the most was some time after that when Joan took possession of the lawn, and after pulling what seemed like an endless amount of line from her reel and depositing it at her feet, demonstrated how to feed line out while false casting, first with basic casting, then adding drift, then the single and double haul and finally, using her entire body in one graceful movement, she shot the entire length of line out to land in a perfect cast. What a treasure to spend time with this extraordinary woman and marvel at her skills! Other high points were the personal ones: a) FINALLY accomplishing an acceptable roll cast. b) Out smarting the nasty black flies the second day (…pure accident, I think they hated the Redken hair product I'd used.) c) And with increasing consistency, doing everything right enough to see my line sailing out over the pond for quite a nice distance with almost no effort. "Once you get it, you will feel it is right and the desired result will follow.
Once you know how that feels, you will want to settle for nothing less." Joan
Wulff. That's where I want to be, settling for nothing less. I'm not there yet, but
I'm closer than I was. |