Lessons from the WFFC

THE RAINBOW WARRIOR THE RAINBOW WARRIOR
THE RAINBOW WARRIOR

Catching a lot of trout is the name of the game at the annual World Fly Fishing Championships.

During its 38 years, the competitors from the most successful nations have learned many lessons that could benefit us as recreational fly fishers. Yes, there’s more to fly fishing than catching a lot of fish, but we all want hookups, and these people are masters at it.

The WFFC competitions are run by the Fédération Internationale de Pêche Sportive Mouche — FIPS Mouche — which is the fly-fishing arm of CIPS, the Confédération Internationale de la Pêche Sportive. CIPS was founded in Rome in 1952 and is the world organizing body for all the many different disciplines of fishing. FIPS-Mouche was founded in 1989 in San Marino to encourage the practice of sport fly fishing throughout the world. In the World Fly Fishing Championships, each national team has six members. Six rounds of fly fishing with a duration of three hours each are held at five different locations, a mixture of lakes and rivers to test all skills. The venues are chosen by the host nation for their abundant trout and game fish populations. All fish caught are measured for length, rather than weight, and returned to the water alive. Rankings are based on total number of fish caught.

In the event of a tie, the total length of all fish caught breaks the tie.

This year marks the thirty-ninth year of this competition, which will be held in December on the island of Tasmania, which has the best fishing of the host nation, Australia. Last year’s competition was held in the Trentino region of Italy and was won by Spain. The best that the U.S. team has done was second place in 2015, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which included a third-place individual finish by Devin Olsen, author of Tactical Fly Fishing: Lessons Learned from Competition for All Anglers, an absolute must read for anyone wishing to catch lots of trout. Spain and France, along with the Czech Republic and Italy, have been the top four teams in the world over the past eight years, followed by the United States in fifth place over that time.

Competitive fly fishing is not the kind of fishing that most of us do — or can do, physically and mentally: trying to find the seams and drop-offs that hold the fish in a beat 70 to 150 meters long, high-sticking like an obsessive compulsive for three hours straight, then repeating that process five more times over a two-day period. But there are things we can learn from these driven competitors. Most successful competitors avoid using dry flies, even if a hatch is occurring, because far more emerging nymphs are consumed subsurface than duns on the surface, even if the fish are in a prime feeding lie. When there is no hatch, some form of direct-line connection to a brace of nymphs tumbling near the bottom of the stream is the technique that the most successful competitors use. Call it high-sticking, but with a European influence. The leader incorporates a “sighter” for strike detection, often just a foot or two of colored monofilament, which is preferred in place of floating indicators. The latter suspend the flies just above the bottom, but interrupt direct connection with them, thus impairing strike detection. Rather than actual fly lines, the use of a line consisting of thin, untapered leader material is typical (also enhancing strike detection), and the cast relies on centrifugal force rather than the weight of the line to load the rod.

The most successful competitors fish small, heavily weighted nymphs (WFFC rules do not allow weight to be placed on the leader). The theory is that trout will take a small fly (sizes 18 through 22) in much the same way as we humans grab a chip with some dip as we pass the hors d’oeuvres table, very quickly and with little if any thoughtful consideration. The evolution of those small f lies, such as Egan’s Frenchie, the Rainbow Warrior, Devin Olsen’s Blowtorch, or the Spanish-designed Perdigon has resulted in most nymphs being built on a barbless, 60-degree jig hook with a slotted tungsten bead and several wraps of .010-inch or .015-inch lead wire stuffed up against and into the bead. The hook point always rides in an up position, dramatically reducing snags and thus wasted time rerigging. The flies almost always include a hot spot of color, usually in the thorax area just behind the bead. Tails are made of pheasant tail fibers or the more expensive, but thinner and much stronger Coq de Leon. To reduce friction and quicken the nymph’s descent to the bottom, its abdomen is often narrow.

The gear for competition fly fishing is usually a 3-weight or 4-weight rod, 10 to 11 feet long, which affords longer drifts, although 9-foot 5-weights, the standard trout rod, can certainly be effective. A 3-weight 10-foot rod has a sensitive tip to detect strikes, but also sufficient strength in the lower butt section to handle most trout.

Leaders vary depending on water type. On a high-gradient stream with pocket water, a leader typically consists of 10 to 12 feet of 8-pound-test untapered leader material attached to the fly line, followed by a sighter of 2 feet of colored line such as Amnesia in red or chartreuse, then a tippet ring and 3 to 5 feet of 5X fluorocarbon tippet to the first fly, usually a heavily weighted nymph, and then 14 to 18 inches of 6X fluorocarbon tippet to an unweighted dropper fly attached with a Nonslip Loop Knot to permit it to move with the tiny microcurrents. (Add these lengths up, and it becomes clear that you are not casting much fly line, if any, when nymphing Euro-style.) On streams with less gradient, such as most spring creeks, a longer leader is used, even up to 20 feet, cast almost directly upstream using small pellet-style Spanish Perdigon-type flies. The upstream cast makes it easier to keep the flies dead-drifting with the longer leader.

Competition fly fishers almost always use a flick of the wrist at the end of each drift to bring the brace of flies close to the surface, making the next cast a simple matter of windmilling or catapulting the flies to the next seam or drift line.

Besides dead drifting, many competition anglers fish their flies with occasional slow or quick lifts and drops during the drift, giving them signs of life that often elicit strikes from trout, which are basically attack predators. Another tactic is a version of the Leisenring Lift: stopping the rod and allowing the flies to swing toward the surface, pushed by the current, several times during the course of a drift to emulate emerging insects. Many competition fly fishers are also now using small “ jig streamers” such as Slumpbusters, swung with short, quick lifts and drops to represent a leech pattern. Almost all of these competition anglers fish the entire water column, starting near the top and working down, usually by changing to heavier and heavier tungsten bead Euro nymphs.

Because of the need to maintain direct contact with a nymph, the competitive angler works in close proximity to the trout. Stealth becomes critical. Shirts, hats, gloves, and other attire must blend in with the natural environment. No stainless steel reflectors, such as hemostats, should be visible. Metal wading staffs must have a rubber tip as the sound of metal striking rock is transmitted very well through water.

As often happens in competition, the evolution of new tactics and techniques proceeds quickly, so we’ll likely see additional changes in the future that can make even those of us who don’t fish competitively more successful anglers. And even if there is more to fly fishing than catching fish, it’s still what we’re all out there to do.