Last month on the Madison, a buddy of Nick Conklin's tried everything he could to force an indicator

into a skinny windblown run, 30 mile an hour gusts, a five-foot high bank behind him, and flies that kept getting yanked through the surface as it touched the water.

He finally picked up and 11-foot two-hander took a couple of steps in the same water that shut down everyone else. He swung up to healthy Madison Browns. Not because he's a hero, but because he was willing to change the technique when the river clearly demanded it. This is the wet fly swing podcast where I show you the best places to travel to for fly fishing, how to find the best resources and tools to prepare for that big trip and what you can do

to give back to the fish species we all love. That little moment says everything about today's episode.

Nick Conklin has spent years traveling from Montana to North Carolina to the Texas coast.

He's been involved in the designing of TFO rods, testing new materials, and breaking down casting

from some of the greats like Jason Randall

and Ed Javaroski. Today, we're going to get into high sticking versus indicator versus swinging

and why none or better, but why you might choose either of those and how on windy days this

exposed your casting fundamentals. We're also going to get into the scadget heads and lighter two-handed and where this is going to fit well as far as Trout Spay. If you're interested in learning more about Trout Spay and getting into that, we're going to get into some rods and lines that you need to get started. We're going to hopefully take the guesswork out of it today. and we're also going to get some of Nick's background on what he's

into most and how that's been successful through TFO. All right, let's get into it. You can check

in with Nick at TFO rods.com. Here he is, Nick Conklin. How you doing, Nick? Doing very well.

How are you this morning? I'm great. Great to have you back on here on the podcast. We had, we were just looking back at it. It's going to be turning around to 26. It's going to be a couple years, episode 599 when we had you on. We were talking about kind of fish and pressured waters. You had a new book, I think, that was coming out at the time, and then we talked about some outfits with TFO.

Today we're going to get a little bit of an update on some other stories. I think we're going to focus a little bit on indicator versus high sticking and some other techniques out there. But I also want to get an update on TFO, what's new there? Give me an update. What have you been the last year and a half or so? What's been anything new out there with you or TFO? Yeah, I've been fishing a lot, been working on a bunch of new rods, you know, on the TFO side of things, doing a lot of the consumer shows still and getting out talking to folks and getting them to cast rods, talk about rods, talk about reels, some new exciting products this year. We've got two new combo kits that we just introduced this past summer at iC and then a kind of more of a high end premium faster, stiffer type of saltwater rod. So, you know, just trying to keep refreshing things and provide some high quality tools for people and encourage them to keep fishing and enjoying the sport. Nice. Remind us again, what is your role with TFO there? Yeah. So I am the category manager, which is just a corporate fancy term for the guy that handles all the product design, development, sales. And then I work with our sales reps and our advisors, you know, folks like Jason Randall, people like that you've had on your show before, and then work all the consumer shows and events. I run that component of the business as well.

That's right.

Yeah, we've talked about that.

We've had a number of different TFO, you know, ambassadors and folks on the show.

And part of the TFO, the history, just so if those don't know what they're new, is that TFO really, I mean, I guess you can go back to the original founder.

He made a connection with Lefty Kray and really some of the biggest names in fly fishing was able to bring them into the TFO world. And that really seems like that helped to launch them. Do you think that's a big part of the success early on with TFO? Oh, absolutely. And he was able to bring in some pretty diverse personalities. You know, you had someone like a lefty who had really no formal education or physics, science background, but was able to describe how to load a rod, how to unroll a flyline in a very interesting way that connected with a lot of people. Then in the opposite side, he had someone like Ed Javarowski, who's been an absolute student and still is, which, You know, there's a lot of mornings. We'll have an email exchange or be on the phone, and I'm just blown away by his energy. He's in his 80s now, but he comes, he came from it and comes from it from much more of a physics, science background, and, you know, he'll spend time working with golfers. And hell admit, he doesn't golf, but he just likes to understand how they proceed threw a swing and hit the ball. And he was able to bring in, Rick Pope was able to bring in a lot of interesting personalities that approach the sport from a lot of different point of views. And that's definitely help, you know, help start the business, help start the company. And then since then, a lot of just good personalities that are entrenched in the sport that are really good with working with people and really understand different techniques and different areas of the country,

different areas of the world and just how to help improve people's time on the water and get them to a, get them to a place where they can cast so they can fish and have fun and really start to, you know, build the skills to become a proficient angler. Right. And casting is kind of the number one. I keep going with

our group. You know, we have a wetfly swing pro art community. It's, I'm trying to build some, you know, some information there around. What's the first thing people need to work on, you know, when they come in if they're, you know, whether they're experience or new. And it feels like casting is the one. It's always the thing, you know, you got flight tying, you name the thing,

reading water, but it feels like casting is the one. It's always the thing. You know, you got flight tying, you know, you name the thing, reading water. But it feels like casting is the biggest thing. Do you focus on, like, how do you guys think about the casting? Do you, because I know you do a lot. You got the two-handed stuff. You got everything. How do you focus to help just providing value for anglers out there, short of like, obviously the rods you deliver? Yeah, outside of the rod component, I mean, a cast, right?

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