The Sheringham Society AGM

Sweet Challenge Champion Tod

With some hundreds of years of mixed experience, the Barley Mow is particularly accommodating of strange-looking anglers, so when we arrived carrying numerous split cane rods, they turned not a hair. The AGM was held over an outstanding fish-pie lunch, washed down with some very fine ale.

There were several excellent motions for consideration at the AGM, and all were carried, probably. Unfortunately, the secretary was in the loo for most of the meeting, and the Chairman Mike Burrowes was absent, so it was decided to hold the 2009 AGM in 2010. We proceeded to the river.

The Sheringham Society All England Casting Championship is a very serious event. Distances achieved are measured to the nearest inch with a Leica laser rangefinder captured from a German field general in 1944. The fact that it measures in Imperial suggests that even then they expected to lose the war. Casting over grass does seem to be rather a strange idea, so the Sheringham event is held on the river. The system adopted is to focus the rangefinder on the ‘kersplosh’ on the surface of the river, and this has proved to be acceptable to all entrants.

The various events turned up several surprises, to put it mildly. Jaw dropper of the day was the Blue Riband F.W.K Wallis float casting event, which is usually dominated by the Society’s swagger of Wallis Grand Masters. However, the big names were not quite on form on the day, and the laurel leaves went to rank outsider Stacey Weeks (infamous for his gold tooth and odd shoes) who fluked an extraordinary left hand Wallis cast of 33yards 2 feet, 7 inches. That, is an amazingly long cast with a three swan-shot float rig, and it is much, much further than most people realise. Most Wallis casts are about half as far as they are estimated to be. Stacey was using his favourite Coxon & Waterman Hogwarts Series ‘Ravenclaw’ Wizard, with a hundred-year-old Coxon Aerial. Stacey was sensible enough to quit while he was ahead, and wore a flashing gold-toothed grin for the next three hours.

Wallis Champion Weeks – with borrowed kit

Dipper and Tod

There was a new event this year, The Lionel Sweet Challenge for direct casting with a one ounce lead off a centre-pin reel (that is, without the Wallis cast draw on the line). This is a tricky cast to master, and the learning process is likely to be marked by the sudden deaths of unsuspecting by-passers several hundred yards distant, and many broken windows. John Olliff-Cooper WGM was robbed of the title when the venerable old Leica rangefinder went temporarily on the blink whilst measuring a cast that looked to be all of a hundred yards. The laurel leaves went to jolly green giant Stuart Tod of Monmouth, with a cast of 82 yards, 1 foot, 8 inches. JMO-C scored an official second place with 79 yards. Further insult was added because Stuart was using JMO-C’s equipment: a 1950’s 10′ Norris salmon spinning rod/ 1930’s double ventilated Aerial 4″. There is no justice.

Sad to say, many of the events went unrecorded because everyone was laughing so much, but veteran Wallis Grand Master Keith Mason was seen to be casting whole silk fly lines with his impossibly-heavy old Hardy Pope. Keith has been re-named Dipper, because he dips like a dipper bird every time he goes for a big cast. Also worthy of mention is Wallis Wannabe John Henwood, who impressed everyone with his unceasing attempts to emulate the fluid styles of the attending Masters.

We shared the river with walkers, who thought we were all completely mad; with swimmers, who thought that we were all completely mad; and with boating types, who thought that we were all completely mad. We saw some beautiful electrically driven Thames launches, narrow boats, near-naked ladies, swallows, picnicking families, and a family of newly hatched coot chicks. With the sounds of our backing group of cheerful people, willow warblers and chiffchaffs ringing in our ears, we laughed like drains, and thereby probably added many years to our allotted spans. It was a wonderfully happy day. But then, that’s not really surprising, because these days are always wonderfully happy. Good eh?