Getting better….

One thing I have learned about teaching, is that much of what I do after 50ish years….is almost unconscious.
So I think out loud with a client by “Thinking about what to do?”. (You can do this by yourself, but hopefully no strangers around to wonder about your sanity.)
They give their input, I give mine…..we pre-visualize the process. I think of it as front loading success…
This started partly due to big fish. that bolted, and I lost them. One of the local fish’s favorite moves.
I started looking where I might run, should it happen on this drift.
Started landing more fish…..
Applied this approach to all facets of play, and started landing even more fish.
The better I got at thinking about how it will go; Perfect first drift, menu choice, best set, etc… bigger fish came to hand more often with fewer drifts. And I add….if you do everything perfectly, you should expect a fish…so don’t be surprised! Too much surprise…stats go down.
To get to the level of one-drift, one fish….it is mandatory to plan ahead. I started thinking about one drift, only because it happened on accident a lot while teaching…often on the first drift.
So, I figured if you could do it on accident often, you could do it on purpose more often.
This goes for all styles, dry, nymph, streamer…
The result of not fishing randomly, and paying attention to what you are doing…is your stats go up.
Making 200 poorly considered drifts with the “lucky fly”, setting willy-nilly and then just standing and watching when you manage to hook-up…not so much. At least it never helped me….
I think of this as a secret in plain sight…..anyone can find it. If there is a divide between the recreational fisher, and the pro/advanced fisher, this is it. Plus thousands of water hours of course.
It is hard to share the feeling of calling it (this drift) and then having it work out correctly with a fish of dreams…. Honestly, the only thing better than me doing this, is watching a student realizing this by one-drifting a fish purposefully and netting it.
Once you do this a few times you realize it is not an accident…..or luck.
I ask people, what do you do, when you do it perfectly? Answer, do it again…..