S6, Ep 24: Casting Angles with Mac Brown
Dive into the essence of a successful angler's mindset with host Marvin Cash and the insightful Mac Brown on this episode of The Articulate Fly. As spring teases with its early arrival, Marvin and Mac reflect on the challenges faced by competitors during the recent Nationals, where cold, sleet and high waters tested the mettle of anglers from all corners.
Mac, a seasoned instructor and guide, shares his observations from the event, setting the stage for a profound discussion on the four components of an angler's mindset: curiosity, discipline, humility and observation. He emphasizes the importance of remaining curious and disciplined, advocating for practice as a means to achieve angling aspirations and the humility to acknowledge the limits of one's knowledge.
Delving deeper, Mac encourages anglers to adopt the perspective of a naturalist, to question everything from the behavior of birds to the patterns of fish, and to remain in sync with the natural world. This holistic approach, he suggests, is not only key to fly fishing success but also a positive posture for life in general.
Listeners are invited to join Marvin and Mac for a deeper dive in their upcoming class on the fundamentals of casting, promising to strip away the fluff and zero in on the core skills that elevate an angler's craft.
Whether you're prepping for the upcoming season, seeking guidance or simply looking to enrich your fly fishing journey, this episode is a must-listen. So, tie some flies, plan your next adventure and, as always, tight lines!
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Marvin: Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly,
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Marvin: and we're back with another Casting Angles with Mack Brown. How you doing, Mack?
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Mac: I'm doing great. How you doing, Marvin?
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Marvin: As always, just trying to stay out of trouble, and you know, it's kind of funny.
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Marvin: Everybody's excited that spring came a little bit early in our neck of the woods.
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Mac: Oh yeah it's been it's been really nice uh really nice warm days and i had a few,
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Mac: few exciting days there during the nationals last week that a lot of rain and
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Mac: cold but um for the most part i think it was the third most mild february on record yeah.
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Marvin: It's interesting about the nationals i imagine some of those guys from out west
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Marvin: that are used to fishing tailwaters were We're a little bit surprised at how
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Marvin: much water is in the system.
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Mac: Yeah, the creeks are plenty high. And the rains, of course, brought it up a little more.
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Mac: But it was cold. Like Friday, I watched the sessions up in Cherokee on the Ravens
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Mac: Fork and the general water as well.
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Mac: And I tell you, it was cold. I mean, 1 o'clock and it was still 33 degrees.
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Mac: It was a mix of sleet and snow and rain the whole morning and not the most ideal,
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Mac: pleasant conditions to be out in with the wind and all too.
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Mac: So, yeah, that was probably, I think, the toughest day was Friday from what I saw.
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Marvin: Yeah, and it was interesting. We started talking before we started recording,
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Marvin: and kind of the idea we had to talk about this time, you know,
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Marvin: from you watching everybody fish the nationals, was to talk a little bit about
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Marvin: the four components of mindset.
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Mac: Yeah, yeah, that'd be a great topic, and we'll hit a few of those maybe on our,
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Mac: On our show tomorrow, on the fundamentals casting that we've got going on tomorrow
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Mac: night, I thought that would be a good lead-in for what does that require.
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Mac: The first one, we'll just jump into it. The first one I would say is remaining curious.
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Mac: The more curious you remain, the faster I think you're going to grow.
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Mac: And so I think that's really one of the big components is having that curiosity that remains high.
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Mac: And then the second one, I think,
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Mac: is discipline, like discipline to how to get to where you want to be.
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Mac: I mean, that goes into what we've been preaching for 38 years.
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Mac: Like, how much does somebody practice? Oh, never.
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Mac: Then they go out on the river expecting to do great things, but yet they've
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Mac: never practiced anything.
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Mac: So it's just like that's kind of a waste of time. So we'll just say that you've
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Mac: got to get disciplined and get a regimen of practice. practice.
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Mac: And if you don't have that, then you're kind of wasting time spinning your wheels, you know.
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Mac: And then the third one would be humility, you know, because if you think you
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Mac: know way more than you really do know, then you're probably in trouble.
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Mac: And I think the best people that I know out there as far as instructors,
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Mac: teachers, and even the comp anglers that are on top of the world right now,
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Mac: they're incredibly humble because they're always trying to get more.
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Mac: Yet, didn't And you see the ones that are not as humble and I think they know
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Mac: a lot. And that's kind of a dangerous recipe as well.
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Mac: Cause that's kind of a limit to getting where they wanna be as well.
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Mac: And I'll go ahead, hit the fourth one is, and this falls under it with observation,
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Mac: that is to remain a naturalist and question everything.
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Mac: Like when you go out, and I don't mean just the fish and what bugs are in a
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Mac: spider web. I mean, are the birds singing or is it dead quiet?
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Mac: Are the cows laying down? Are they walking around seed and all those things,
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Mac: I think with the best anglers that I've known over the years,
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Mac: they're incredibly in tune, call it in sync, being a naturalist.
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Mac: They pay attention to everything, not just what they're doing, going to the river.
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Marvin: Yeah, and I think all those things put together really is kind of a positive
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Marvin: posture for life, right?
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Marvin: I mean, because if you kind of put all that together, you know,
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Marvin: the people that you find that not just are successful in the fly fishing world,
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Marvin: but in other aspects of, let's just say, air quotes, real life, right? Right.
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Marvin: You know, these are people that are incredibly disciplined about improving.
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Marvin: They never stop and they're always curious.
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Mac: Yeah i mean it's just like jimmy jimmy's one of my best friends here that you
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Mac: know jimmy estes that did the the mop fly back in the mid 90s and i fished with
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Mac: jimmy since i moved here in 87,
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Mac: and when i looked at the curiosity level i think jim is in his early 80s now,
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Mac: and uh he's still just tinkering non-stop kind of like in the light of dame juliana's book,
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Mac: trees of fishing with an angle which was the first book ever written on the
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Mac: sport of fly fishing and she's real encouraging throughout that book about making
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Mac: all your own gear and modifying it when you can and keep growing and tinkering
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Mac: with stuff and he's still tinkering with lines,
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Mac: probably more so now than when he when he you know had a real job he's been
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Mac: in retirement for years but i mean every time i see him he's like mac i got
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Mac: another line i want you to try and he's all the time playing with all these
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Mac: different setups and just tinkering in other words he's never ever really content with where he is.
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Mac: And that's really kind of a beautiful thing. Talk about curiosity.
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Mac: He's still as curious as when he first started as a kid, you know?
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Mac: So I think that's a good attribute.
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Marvin: Yeah. And, you know, folks, we're going to take a deeper dive into this.
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Marvin: So this is going to come out Wednesday morning on the 6th. On that evening,
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Marvin: Mac and I are going to be doing a class, The Fundamentals of Casting.
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Marvin: And we've been talking about this quite a bit on the Casting Angles series.
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Marvin: You know, we've worked really, really hard to try to kind of distill things
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Marvin: down to kind of get rid of kind of the noise and the fluff because we don't
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Marvin: like fluff, do we, Mac Brown?
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Mac: No, no. It's funny that out there on the World Wide Web.
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Marvin: Yeah, so to try to boil it down, and so the link will be in the show notes.
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Marvin: It's going to be at 7.30 Eastern time. If you can't make it,
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Marvin: no worries. We're going to record it and it'll be up there.
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Marvin: But it's the first in a series of three parts,
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Marvin: that's going to, I think, really help you have a completely different perspective
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Marvin: perspective about how casting fits into your fishing life on the water and you
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Marvin: know mac i know you've got one fly fishing show coming up to go go to and you're done right.
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Mac: Yeah, I'll be done after this coming weekend,
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Mac: and I'll go to Michigan on Friday, so the Midwest Fly Fishing Expo,
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Mac: and we wrap up Sunday night, and I think that's my last one,
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Mac: unless I go to, I might go to Munich still, I don't know, but I'm not sure on
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Mac: that, I hadn't committed to that one yet.
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Marvin: Well, that sounds interesting, get on an airplane, fly across the pond, right? Right.
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Mac: Oh, yeah. The only reason I want to do it if I go is there's a lot of friends
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Mac: that I've did I teach with over there over the years that I'd like to see.
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Mac: And I don't get to see him that much in America. So if I did go to that, it'll be more for me.
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Mac: I'll have to teach and do the same things that I do here, but it'd be more the
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Mac: industry friends that work there.
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Mac: For me, that that would be that'd be the only reason I consider it right now.
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Marvin: Yeah, got it. And, you know, it's warming up. So, you know, I imagine that means
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Marvin: guide trips and schools. Where can folks get more information?
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Mac: The best place is probably on the website. It's at flyfishingguideschool.com
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Mac: for the school information.
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Mac: And then macbrownflyfish.com would be the best place to find out.
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Mac: And it has all the contact info and it spells out, you know,
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Mac: big thing too, I'll just emphasize is read it. because the worst thing in the
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Mac: world, I've been in tourism 38 years and it's not fun answering the phone and
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Mac: everything's written in the first paragraph but people didn't read the first paragraph.
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Mac: You know what I'm saying? So they ask you the same thing that's already there.
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Mac: So there's a reason why we put a lot of time in writing it and making it pretty
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Mac: concise and to the point.
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Mac: And I don't think many people spend more than a few seconds.
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Mac: They see the website and they're like, there's Marvin's number, I'm going to call him.
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Mac: But there's a reason it's written up in the first paragraph how it works.
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Marvin: Yeah, and interesting too, right? Right. Because it kind of goes back to the
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Marvin: whole mindset conversation we started out this episode with that tells you a whole lot.
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Marvin: Right. About how that person internalizes the mindset for improvement.
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Mac: Yeah. Yeah. It kind of ties right back into it, doesn't it?
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Marvin: Yeah. And so, you know, folks, check out the schools, get out on the water with
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Marvin: Mac and, you know, it's warming up.
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Marvin: You know, if you're out west, we've still probably got a few more fly fishing
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Marvin: shows running kind of, you know, maybe into March, deeper into March, maybe early April.
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Marvin: Roll but you know go to a show if the weather where you are is not great tie
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Marvin: some flies otherwise get out on the water tight lines everybody tight lines matt tight lines marvin.
Mac Brown
Guide | Casting Instructor | Author
Mac Brown is the owner of Mac Brown Fly Fish and Fly Fishing Guide School in Western NC. Mac created the first full-time fly fishing guide service in Western North Carolina. The first Delayed Harvest on the Upper Nantahala River in early 1993 was also a result of his efforts.
Mac Brown is the author of “Casting Angles” which is a fly casting handbook for those on the journey of understanding the mechanics of the cast. The ACA, FFI, and others have endorsed this text as a reference for instructors as well. Mac is a Master Casting Instructor through the Fly Fishers International.
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