About the Series

After becoming frustrated with textbook and online discussion of physics for fly casting I decided to write this series. Along the way I had to line up any normal considerations of publishing, commerciality and popularity included, and push them all over the side of the boat. It was a liberating experience and watching them disappear beneath the waves gave me unexpected pleasure.

I next had to assemble an Advisory Group to save me from talking rubbish. The Group includes physics boffins with an interest in and commitment to, fly casting, prominent casting instructors and some consumer reps – guys who were curious enough to be interested in this stuff and well smart enough to understand it if I could manage to explain myself clearly. Here they are in category and alphabetical order:

Vince Brandon

Grunde Løvoll

Aitor Coterón

Graeme Hird

Mark Surtees

Bruce Marshall

Blake Robertson

They all contributed generously, not least in boosting my confidence by agreeing so quickly to accept my invitation to help and be part of the project. It seems inadequate to say I couldn’t have done it without them but it is simply true. That said I accept full responsibility for any stuff ups that have sneaked past the guard posts. I want to thank them all for their generous and invaluable contributions. Without in any way diminishing my gratitude and appreciation of their combined efforts there are a few special mentions it would be unworthy to omit because they switched me onto things I might otherwise have not included or even known about.

Aitor has for some years been the closest thing I’ve had to a casting mentor. Among the many subjects he has enlightened me about was the loop and the relationship between the two legs of the fly line. Thanks mate, for everything, over the years and during the project.

Mark clued me into Impulse, the time dimension of casting and rod preference. It all made good and perfect sense the way he explained it.

Vince persuaded me to include waves and mends at a time when I was thinking seriously of omitting them. His explanation of them and how the relevant physics were important to him, got me over the line with reassurance I had been, after all, mostly on the right track.

The series has six episodes:

Introduction

Straight Lines Rule

What the Rod is and Does – Really

What the Line Does – Really

Other Casts and Other Stuff

Endnote

All episodes of the series are subject to a Creative Commons Licence.They can each be reproduced provided it is in full, with due attribution, without alteration, and not for commercial gain. They were created as a free resource for those interested. For my fellow pilgrims, I hope you get some use and inspiration from the material.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.