I wished I tested cast a few rods, but the west pond(meant for test casting and practice)was busy pretty much the whole time. The only time it wasn't busy, was during the finals. I didn't feel like casting rods in front of a crowd, with world champions doing their thing in the next pond. A couple bamboo, and graphite speys were calling my name though. I picked up a nice reel in the club, silent auction.
If you are thinking of getting into spey, do it.......
So I don't feel so alone here. 
Anderson had an absolutely gorgeous, flamed bamboo rod on display. He also had some grass speys in the rod rack to demo. I did not dare pick one up. And yes, he does an awesome job on Sages, and his own rods. I have a couple of his "trout speys", and cannot say enough good things about them.
The two days had swirling, windy conditions. I think the scores reflected that. Give a world champ a favorable wind and he'll make a ridiculously long cast. Unfavorable wind means they are human, but still cast longer than 99.9%. And yeah, they cast on still water. It's a little different than moving water, and my guess is most, if not all, practice on still water. They also cast while standing crotch deep in the water. That's different than some other competitions I've seen where they stand above the water. Big deal when you are casting for distance.
IMHO, for pure pleasure, spey does beat pinning.....but not in the fish count category.
briansII
