The Samurai of the BFCC

Well, what can I say about the BFCC and the Sportfish Reading Open Show?
Jan (my beautiful and long suffering girlfriend) and myself turned up on a grey Saturday morning at 8.30 a.m. with a slight drizzle in the air.

We went into the giant marquee,  to be greeted by the boss (Michael Marshall) with a big grin on his face.
That lifted my spirits straightaway, as with all our other  instructors away on other commitments, or far too ill to take part, I was a bit nervous, as to how we would cope.

Sure I can get the clients to have a lesson, but Mike who was our only instructor for the day is not a man in his early thirties, so I would have to pace things out. I was about  to be proved wrong.

It was very slow to start with but by 11 a.m. when people realised that it was going to be a dull weekend, weather-wise, they probably thought “stuff  this I am not going to let a bit of rain beat us”, the whole place started to buzz.

Mike Marshall took up his starting position, made up his trusty rod with the same care that an old battle weary warrior would do with his weapon of choice and then shouted out to me “send them out Rog”.

It was then that the British Fly Casting Club swung into action. I have done this a few times and it was with the ease of familiarity that myself and Jan started to take our eager clients out to meet Mike.

I was staggered that by 4.p.m. when things eased off,  he was not only still standing, but turned and said to me “is that all you got” with that same big grin on his face that he had from 8.30 a.m.
Mike had not had a single minute’s break

Sunday was virtually the same as Saturday, but with the arrival  of Alex Titov, another of our instructors it meant that we cranked things up a gear, which is just as well, because there were three times as many people to get through.

Truly an astonishing weekend.

I cannot leave this report without warm thanks to the following:

Firstly to my girlfriend Jan for the smiles to our clients, endless  cups of tea and also selling some of the books.

Matt Hayes for letting me drag him over for a picture session. Thanks Matty.

Gary Coxon of Sage. Thanks for the pics Gary (from your favourite West Indian)

Jerry Siem of Sage. I tried to get the girls (Jan and Tracy) to wriggle against him during the pics, but I did not get a free Sage Rod. What a nice guy.

Simon Gawesworth, who stopped his book signing session to be photographed on our stand, and also stayed for a cup of tea and a chat. Quite a unique person.

Alex Titov, has recently qualified AAPGAI, what a feat. He has only just returned from teaching in Russia. Over there you have to be extremely  good as they will still send you to Siberia, or worse, make you recite all the words from the film Taras Bulba.
Congratulations  Alex.

BFCC Members  James Evans and his lady Tracy Thomas for being there and helping out. Thanks Tracy and James.

Gilly Bate, a friend of Mike Heritage. Thanks for stopping by Gilly and making me laugh. By the way Gilly, the BFCC has its eye on you for the future.

Thanks to Richard Tallents of Masterline-Cortland for his donation of a Flyline to the BFCC.

Thank you to new members:
Mark Kirkhouse
Sally Taylor
Mick Copeman
Alan  Corker

A very  big thanks to all our new clients, you are the real stars of the show, we hope to see you at other “friendly” get togethers at the BFCC.
Sometimes the guys say to me “what is your secret to getting people to stop and talk to you”.
The answer is there is no secret. Fly Fishers, along with most anglers are kind, friendly, patient and very approachable, that is why they are the stars of the show, it makes what I do a real pleasure.

I will close now by saying that none of this would have been possible without our man on the inside, Jonathan Tomlinson, who worked like a beaver  to make it all happen

Thank you very much Jono.

Roger Miles

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 11th, 2010 at 3:28 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.