I’ve been working on my cast and video taped myself this past weekend. I’ve identified two things that I definitely need to work on and one additional issue that I believe may be a problem but wanted to pick the collective brain.
Looking at a freeze frame of my final forward stroke, the line is clearly shooting through the guides while a good amount of the line is still behind my head. It seems to me a lot of the energy that would be available to unfurl the loop is being dissipated by the fly line shooting. So the line shoots several feet through the guides but the tip of the line and the leader doesn’t completely unroll. Am I thinking about this correctly? Am I shooting the line too soon? Other than a “feel” thing, is there any trick on when to let the line shoot? I’d anticipate that shooting too late would also be a problem.
a second problem that I’m sure is exacerbating this is that on that final stroke I’m “reaching out” and driving the rod tip down, below horizontal, which is destroying what had been fairly decent tight loops on the false casts. I was casting into the wind so I’m sure that didn’t help. Will be working on that one…
Welcome to my world. Definitely keep videoing. It will really help. Work on the timing and final shot and then video again. I love the slow motion video for this purpose.
Hard to tell without a video, but sounds like you may need to wait a second longer on your backcast and also, like you said, stop your rod tip up higher. Let the rod do the work and take your time with the cast. Don’t get so focused on shooting line that you’re not letting your back cast fully develop. “Feel” is really muscle memory. Watch your backcasts if you’re not, as Flip said, they’re your report card.
@JOD73
Way too much information to share online. What is a pretty simple concept takes too much, for me anyway, to put in words. If you’re interested feel free to call me. I can give you a couple of simple exercises that will improve your understanding/haul timing with rotation.
The “eye don’t lie” so keep videoing yourself. It’s a great learning tool.
Best of luck
Here’s my number if you want to talk
631-807-5118
This is a lot to unpack and easier seen than hypothesized. What distance are you seeing this happen? It could be due to how much line you are carrying in the air.
Your second observation relates to the line not unrolling. There are two things that can happen on that final cast - people think they need to over power the last cast and they put way too much force into it, or they reach (extend) the arm thinking they are done and they’ve sent it. The cast loses energy in this case. An abrupt stop is needed. Too much power on the final cast causes the fly and leader to hit the fly line. You don’t have this issue, but if you start to see it when making changes, this is the reason.
A quick improvement to try - on your forward cast, add a little flick or snap of the thumb at the abrupt stop. Think of flinging a potato off the end of a stick. It’s a small change that makes a big difference, but also needs to be done with an abrupt stop and not lowering the rod as mentioned above. Doing this timed with the haul is key - this is referred to as the “power snap” (note, some people don’t like that term, but it’s one that is used).
Another area to consider - practice shooting line on your backcast and laying down completely straight without any problems. If you can do this, the problem isn’t your backcast. This ensures the back cast has enough energy to feed the forward cast at the distance you are aiming. This is great practice on its own regardless of any other area to improve.
Last - without shooting any line, keep your haul hand on the line and make sure it feels a strong tug when casting. This means the rod is loaded and wants more line. This “tug” indicates in the casting stroke when to feed line, and stopping the cast abruptly (the hard stop) is what powers the next motion in the casting stroke, or is the final motion on the forward cast.
I remember back in the day in the SFFFC casting competitions, all I heard was “if you let the one before that go it would’ve gone a mile!”. What that means is that like a lot of folks I was overpowering things and trying to honk it out there. Don’t try to be a hero, just let the hero happen. Timing is everything, and a nice crisp haul at the end does wonders for distance. And don’t drop the tip - line goes where the rod stops.
Like others say, tons to unpack. And I am no expert, but I know a few and they love to pick my cast apart. Just remember - the best cast is the one that catches a fish - thats what matters. The “I had some great loops today” crowd are the same ppl that don’t catch fish.
Way too much going on to really make suggestions. I’m a newb so take this wirh a grain of salt. Couple of aha moments recently.
-Make sure the length of your stroke is appropriate for the distance you are trying to cast.
-Watch for creep
-On the forward stroke initially keep the tip facing back to accentuate the “flick” at the end. Help load the rod. Basically start the translation before the rotation. Not sure if that makes sense. Should be a smooth speed up to a stop.
-Don’t over-rotate on the delivery stroke (sounds Iile you’ve identified that as an issue)
When done right it’s shocking how little power you need to throw a bomb!
On your first question regarding timing: The line should be released to shoot immediately as the loop is initially formed. During the forward cast, you are ideally accelerating all the line outside the rod tip. This line becomes what is called the “fly leg” of the loop. The “rod leg” of the loop forms as the head of the loop travels forward. The rod leg has essentially zero velocity if you don’t release the line. If you release the line late after the loop has formed, then you have wasted some energy in decelerating the line that has become the rod leg. If you release the line early, you lose some of the acceleration of the fly leg.
The proper forward cast has been described as like flicking paint off a paint brush. If you think about throwing (releasing) the line behind you that you are hauling with your line hand at the same time that the paint is coming off the brush, then your timing is good.
I try not to get too technical and just do what feels natural and what works. I take this approach for just about anything and of course practice makes perfect. I learned to shoot line by feel, you’ll know when it’s time if you do it enough. Maybe I’m just weird but it works.
Your first problem is a timing thing. To shoot line, you have to let go of it and if you let go of it too soon you get what you got. Most likely what you’re doing is the same as feeding slack into the cast. With slack in the line you’re not pulling it anymore. Hold on to the line just a tiny bit longer and see if it helps turn over the line, leader and fly
Your second problem is because you’re trying to push the line and you can’t push the line. It’s physically impossible. So you make this forward push and all it does is push the loop open. Or if you do it badly enough, you pull the loop open as your rod tip goes towards the ground. You make a great big wide loop and the fly doesn’t go very far. Practice doing it different. Don’t try to push the line anywhere at the end of the cast. Just let it roll off the rod tip and the rod tip stopped up in the air. Let the line and the loop escape and then as the line starts dropping to the water, follow it with the rod.
Always, always remember that you can only pull the fly line. You cannot push it.
All great advice. I ,like smack, am not super technical about it. But identifying the issues and practice will go a long way. My guess is you are letting the line go to soon, on problem number one. Number two is you are dropping the rod tip and pushing the line. Also as mentioned above, watch your back cast, like literally watch it when you are casting and you will likely see marketable improvement. And again as mentioned above, don’t overpower your casts. It’s a difficult concept to understand and incorporate especially when coming from conventional gear, Where “More power, it go farther”. But not in this case. With a fly rod, it’s more like “less is more”.
This is all really great feedback and hits on several nuances I’m seeing in video. Overall timing, slight creep entering at the start of the forward stroke, overpowering and driving down that last forward stroke.
It’s all related right? I’ve been working on lengthening my stroke from watching capt Chris meyers videos, and it looks like doing ok with that, but I haven’t adjusted my timing accordingly. Casts start good - tight loops, good acceleration to a stop, good rod travel, good feel - just like all the years on a trout stream. But as I’m lengthening the cast, without commensurately changing my timing, all kinds of problems creep in. And then it becomes great, good, overpower, Overpower, OWERPOWER!
I will keep videoing and practicing and report back!
On a side note, imagine trying to learn to cast using ai? Most things in life - fly casting, learning to play a banjo, or weld, or garden, or ride a bike - people need mentors and experts to help them…That’s what all the ai cheerleaders just don’t get.
Fly fishing is a life long adventure and the learning curve is steep. A couple of fly fishing lessons will pay off more than any online advice or new rods, or the latest greatest fly line. I even had my daughter take a lesson when she first started fly fishing and she was nailing 60’ casts catching bones with me in Andros last fall. It is a lot easier to learn good habits than to break bad ones. Good luck.
@JOD73
Simple concept, longer the line in the air, longer the stroke. The majority of line speed comes from “haul intensity”. Faster/longer haul means more line speed. Necessary for distance and essential for head winds.
A lot of accurate information given to you from the guys responding.
PMP=practice makes perfect
PS
Accuracy work makes one a better caster as it makes very visible tracking errors.
Once timing is locked in, you’ll be able to pick up 40 to 50’ of line from the water and shoot it to 60 to 70’ without any false casts. Sounds impossible, but definitely doable.
A similar tug mentioned above on the haul tells the line hand when to haul, but when the line is release and it shoots, then is stopped, a tug will be felt on the rod arm. This is when to “reach” or “drift” - it is a pause, but it is also extending the casting arm to give length to the stroke and it builds more power.
This video shows Rick Hartman’s casting stroke which at first to many seems unconventional due to how far he extends on the backcast. But he is carrying over 100’ of line and casting 130’ to 150’ with a 5 weight. It shows how much drift and reach is needed as the cast gets longer. Play this in slow mo to see what each arm is doing during the casting stroke. Rick has won many distance casting competitions and is a guide on the lower Texas coast.
The longer your stroke, and the longer the line in the backcast, the more energy or power you need to deploy that line aft. Since you have more weight deployed you need more energy in your backcast, however that should translate to a longer pause until you feel the weight of the line so you can load the rod forward and shoot the line.
A common mistake is to overpower the rod or start the forward cast too early because that’s what you did in the previous cast with less line. As you deploy line to create weight to cast forward the timing changes, but it’s in milliseconds, so folks learn to “feel” the line and adjust. I am like @MikeCockman and @Smackdaddy53 i just learn to feel the weight before going forward. I am not a powerful caster, but good mechanics allow good distances, however I would say I’m very accurate and that makes up for some distance. .02c
