When I was stationed at HMN in the USAF, I was practicing casting on "The Pond", right at the end of runway 21. I was working on a "Tower" cast when the reel started screaming. Seams I had "Tangled" with an F-15B and it was "Out of there". When the line reached the backing I had a death grip on it, and the liner parted, but, it snatched the rod out of my hands and I had to recover it about 500 yards past the "Pond". I found out later that the plane linked up with an ART, (aerial Refueling Tanker), on its way to Germany. The flight was "Terminated" and the aircraft returned to HMN after linking up with a ART. Total miles round trip, 7540. Would that be considered a "Long Cast", or a "Big Fish"....;-) Jimi
We had a beautiful day today in Utah to start our Christmas break, but the list of honey-dos kept me from going fishing. I was finally free about an hour before sunset and decided to go out and do a little casting with a five weight Scott SAS rod I built. I have actually never measured my casts, so I was curious to know exactly how far I could cast comfortably. I was standing in a park adjacent to a parking lot with the parking stalls spaced 9 feet apart. I counted out 10 stalls and marked it with a paper cup. My first cast, just to get the line out went 82 feet. I thought with a little effort I could easily make it past the 90 foot mark. But it was not to be. The harder I tried, the shorter I cast. So finally I decided to reel in and just see how far I could cast comfortably, without "trying hard" I made a nice easy cast but I didn't have enough line out and the line pulled hard against the reel when it came to the end. I measured that, and it was about 75 feet! So I stripped out 10 feet more and cast about 85 using the same easy stroke. I never did reach the 90 foot mark. 82-85 feet seemed to be the the magic length for me. Any further and I started to get more line out in the back cast than I could comfortably handle. Since you are likely to ask, I was using a double haul.... i guess. Actually for me it is more like a "pumping" motion, a pump when I load the rod with the backcast and another when I load it with the forward cast. It is something I am doing all the time, so I never really think of it as anything more than the casting stroke. So, how do they do it, these guys who are throwing out line well over 100 feet? Anybody out there have any experience with distance casting? I seldom if ever have to cast that far when fishing (I have a hard time seeing a dry fly at 50 feet) but still I am curious how it is done. Tom
