Uber-cool!

sign and photo courtesy of easterncaster

H: April 23, 2013: With closing on my fishing shack postponed yet again, I decided to stop by the Wild Trout Flyrodders' casting rendezvous on Saturday. I saw some good demos, said hello to friends, and watched members of the new Catskills ACA (American Casting Association) Club practice for future games. I even stepped up to the plate and tried my hand at one of the accuracy events. Not quite sure what got into me... ;)

west branch

Unfortunately, strong storms the night before knocked out power and blew out the rivers making fishing afterwards rather pointless. Nevertheless, I went out and cast streamers with my spey rod for a couple of hours on the West Branch—a futile but enjoyable exercise. It was incredibly windy, barely a hendrickson in sight.

Still, I'm glad I went up. Besides hanging out with fellow casting geeks (always a pleasure :), I sat in on a technology for teaching workshop and learned about Ubersense, an iPhone and iPad coaching app that I hope to use on the guinea pigs ;) students at the Juliana's Anglers' school this coming weekend. It's a HD video app that allows you film, playback in slow motion, annotate using a variety of drawing tools (lines, angles, circles), record audio feedback, compare videos side-by-side, and share immediately with your student.

I know that watching video of my casting has been instrumental in my own improvement. Those images are still stuck in my head and whenever I feel my technique slipping, I remember what I learned from them and try to apply it. I'm definitely downloading the Ubersense Golf app for my dad, so he can see just how awful inefficient his golf swing is ;), and hopefully use it to get better.

Ubersense is uber-cool, uber-useful, and I highly recommend it!