IFTD Show Going to New Orleans in 2011
Tweets and emails from the IFTD show floor suggest the industry show may appear in New Orleans next August, which could bring the Underground out of his temporary trade show retirement, especially if a shot at redfish is involved.

Let the good times roll...

Orvis Stuff
Orvis surprised the industry a few years ago with the introduction of its Helios rods, and in addition to a pair of new reels I don't feel like writing about, their new $350 "Access" fly rods sound interesting, and they've announced (surprisingly) yet another remake of the Superfine line.

Read on, Undergrounders.

Access Fly Rods
Are the new Access rods the $350 equivalent to the Hydros, which is the $550 equivalent to the $800 Helios?

I doubt Orvis would put it that way, but that's why you read the Underground instead of product literature... From Manchester:

The new Orvis Access rods introduce a huge breakthrough in mid-priced fly rod designs. Lighter than any other rods in their price class, they utilize the Exclusive Load Ratio developed for the Helios and Hydros rods to produce a taper that feels powerful yet lively when casting or when playing a fish.

Recent breakthroughs in fiber/resin combinations by the military contractor who provides Orvis with its raw materials allow the rod designers to make these rods ultra-lightweight and responsive.

Superfine Fly Rods
Several years ago Orvis "overhauled" the much-beloved Superfine series of fly rods, which had been in production basically forever.

And yes, there was discontent.

Some suggested they'd dramatically over-stiffened the wonderfully smooth rods, and since the company has re-tooled the line so quickly, maybe there was truth to the rumors. From Orvis:

Superfine Touch rods are an entirely new rod series from Orvis. Despite their retro un-sanded finish, they utilize the latest in graphite raw materials, resins, and scrims and an entirely new taper that is as smooth and easy-casting as the original Orvis Superfine, but with more precision and accuracy.

It's a fact that most fly rods today are optimized for casting 35 feet and beyond. When shorter casts are needed (actually in the range most trout are caught), the angler needs to adjust his or her casting style and work too hard to get the rod to flex properly at 15 to 25 feet. The new Orvis Superfine Touch rods were painstakingly designed and tested to make perfect casts at distances less than 30 feet, even though with an adjustment in casting style they can reach out to 60 feet.

According to Orvis Marketing Kahuna Tom Rosenbauer:

"We went back to the drawing board--new mandrels, new material, new taper. What we came up with was a more progressive, less butt-flexing taper that loads perfectly at 10 to 25 feet."

Because I'm a geezer who likes slower, softer rods, I may request one of the new Superfines for testing, comparing it against my sizable stack of old geezer rods, and we'll see how it measures up.

(Probable Sign of Geezerhood: Almost none of the synthetic rods I fish are still available.)

See you at home, Tom Chandler.