When I was an optometry student at Berkeley, I started playing golf. One summer evening, I was practicing with my seven iron at the Tilden Park golf range and I completely flushed a ball. The sound was totally different from my other impacts and of those around me. In my peripheral vision, I could tell that one of the employees of the range, upon hearing the impact, had stopped collecting baskets and had turned around to watch me hit my next ball.
Naturally, I shanked the next ball, but the point of this story is that a poorly struck ball and a well struck ball make different sounds. The employee didn’t have to see the ball flight to know that I had hit a pure shot.
In the same way, I can usually tell who is casting well around me when I am at the pools without looking. The sounds of the cast provide a lot of information.
A poor casting stroke sounds like, “whoosh.” The pitch is low and the duration is long. It’s the hallmark of a caster accelerating the larger diameter sections of the rod too fast and too early.
A good stroke, in contrast, makes a sound towards the end of the stroke: “tsss”. The pitch is high and the duration is short. It’s the result of the rod tip with its narrow diameter whistling through the air during the power snap – after the caster has got the “bend out of the rod.”
At the end of a stroke, the line can also slap loudly against the rod as slack comes and goes.
When I practice my fly casting, I listen to my rod. No music. I try not to socialize, and I avoid practicing during rush hour since the traffic accelerating on the on-ramp to Highway 13 and the hum from the vehicles already on the highway make hearing my rod difficult.
I’m also focussed on my other – perhaps more obvious – senses. I’m trying to feel the rod from the cork to the tip top. I’m waiting for my rod to load. Proprioceptively, I’m trying to keep my hand above my elbow. Letting my arm fall without opening my elbow joint. After I dampen the rod, I look towards the loop, analyzing if and how the wind is affecting the loop’s path. And then, I wait. I think about when I should feel the bump as the fly turns over, and when I actually feel the bump.
When I practice, I am utterly immersed in my fly casting.
I come down to the ponds to work. My enjoyment comes after a good round of targets or after releasing a fish hooked in water that I could not have reached in my earlier days. I can sit back and experience a fleeting sense of satisfaction. It’s not exhilaration. It’s a reserved sense of joy, gratitude and relief. It’s evidence that the skills that I worked hard to improve are, in fact, getting better.
I used to think that, when I came down to the ponds, I was working on my casting AND I was relaxing – at the same time.
Nowadays, I believe that working on my craft and enjoying it are two separate and mutually exclusive activities. Even if they could be combined, they shouldn’t.
And let me be clear. There is nothing wrong if you come to the Oakland casting pools to get away from life, and you simply cast for fun. These hallowed grounds are a gift to everyone to use as they please. Say, “Hi” to the person next to you. Listen to music. Do whatever makes you happy.
But don’t expect to improve (as much as you could). Consider the person who, out of enjoyment, sings the same song over and over. What about the person who goes for the same run every time? I would argue that these people simply maintain the status quo – at best.
Making the same imperfect cast over and over without a target and without quantifiable goals may be soothing, but I think that you are simply ingraining your casting faults.
If, on the other hand, you come down to work on your fly casting, you must challenge yourself and you must be prepared to falter and to look bad. Find and cast your version of a MF rod. Use the targets. And remember to remove your headphones and to silence your notifications.
Listen for the rustle of the leaves in the trees to alert you to a change in the winds. And never ignore the sounds that your rod makes. Your rod is talking to you.
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