Here it is folks. My final session review. For session 5, my group was headed to the Carlit Lakes. These lakes had a similar rotational setup to the Camporells Lakes. We fished four separate one-hour sub-sessions on four different lakes within the chain. Unfortunately, I was not able to get a photo of the beat map during my session so I don't have one to share for you to follow along with the beat numbers. You can find maps of the lakes with a quick google search though.
I set up the same four rods as I did for my sessions on the Camporells Lakes. You can read the details at this link if you like.
I went into the session with a similar plan as I did for the Camporells Lakes. The main difference was that the Carlit Lakes had a bit of a glacial tinge to the water and their clarity was lower than the Camporells Lakes. This made sight fishing a much more challenging proposition. It was possible to get occasional glimpses of fish near the bank or near the surface as they rose. But they would disappear if they retreated to any sort of depth.
I did have our team captain Glade Gunther with me. Captains are the only person besides your controller who can talk to you while you are fishing during sessions. When Nick Ryzka-Filipek was with me on the Camporells Lakes, he could only talk to me during the gaps between sessions. On the Carlit Lakes, Glade would be able to help spot fish or rises when needed to help me find active fish.
I started the morning session at Dugues Lake. This was a smaller lake with a lot of shallower edges. My beat bordered at the shallow outlet on the right and the inlet to the left. My initial thought was that the inlet was my best location. The wind conditions during my scout time changed my plan though. The wind was fairly strong coming from right to left. There was a lot of wind chop near the inlet, but the outlet was at the "top of the wind" on the lake and had less chop. There were a decent number of fish near the outlet that rose at somewhat regular intervals.
Looking up the shallow weedy edge toward the outlet in my beat.
Looking toward the inlet which formed the left side border of my beat.
I decided to target the rising fish near the outlet first. I would give myself 20 minutes to see how things were going and then begin moving my way toward the inlet. I began with a washing line rig. I had an ant dry fly on the point with zebra midges on the dropper tags. One of the midges was weighted to help break the surface.
It did not take long for some action. I made my first cast to a rising fish. The fish took but I launched it out of the water since it was a rainbow only about 15 cm long. Luckily it stayed hooked, and I saved it from a trip into the grass behind me. A few minutes later a fish rose to my right. I covered it and it took my ant dry fly immediately. I set the hook and was on the board three minutes into my session with a 227 mm brown trout.
Staying stealthy going after my first fish.
Getting on the board early in the session. The horses in the background were incredibly noisy with cowbells attached. Glade had to chase them away later in the session so they would not step on my rod carrier.
I continued this same program for most of the rest of the sub-session. The rises were scattered and it was hard to tell which way a fish was going in the low angles of the early morning sun. I got a few of them right and missed several fish on the dries. I also connected with a couple more brown trout that ate one of the midges on my dropper tags.
I never made it down toward the inlet. As the session drew on, I tried to cover some rises out into the lake with my washing line rig. I had to make long casts to these fish which were downwind. At this angle my flies were not drifting with the wind and they looked unnatural even when I tried to feed slack for a drift. My three fish in the sub-session had come closer to the outlet where I could cast at an upstream angle and provide a better presentation and hooking angle when they did take.
I spent the last few minutes crawling nymphs to see if I could draw any takes which might lead to useful information for later sessions as well. No fish cooperated though.
I moved on to Trebens Lake. I had drawn a very long beat with steep sides on the right hand side of the lake. I stopped when I reached my beat marker to look. There were four fish that could occasionally be seen working near the beat marker on my side of the line. I sent Glade up the beat to scout for other fish. He said there were not many for most of the shoreline, but he did see a group of them near the inlet.
Looking toward the inlet on the far side of my beat. I had the entire bank between where I took this photo and the inlet.
The beat was so long that I had to decide to focus on one half or the other. I could leave the fish in front of me to head to the inlet. Or I could focus on the fish in front of me and hope I would see some more along the way where they had not been showing themselves to Glade. I could not see anything all that unique about the area where my beat marker was. I figured there must be more fish that would show themselves if I kept moving along the bank. I also liked the wind direction coming into my face along the bank here. If I went to the inlet it would be behind me again. I decided to stay where I was and make a go of it.
I started my session fishing to the most active fish in front of me. It was a small rainbow that was rising regularly to miniscule midges. I grabbed my double dry rod that had an ant and a small shuttlecock tied to it. The rainbow turned just as I laid my first cast down and headed the opposite way. I repositioned with another cast. The fish spotted my shuttlecock and quickly rose to take it. I set the hook a fraction too fast and hard and felt a prick as the fly flew out of its mouth. GRRRRRR!!
A few seconds later I spotted one of the other fish in the area. It was a larger rainbow that had been occasionally rising through the column to feed before descending back into the depths. I made a cast and it rose more slowly toward my shuttlecock. This time I paused and set more gently and lifted into a 310 mm rainbow to get my fourth fish of the day.
Measuring a fish on my second beat.
I kept working down the bank. At one point a pod of five rainbows came cruising through at the surface about 75 feet out from the bank. I made a cast at the nearest one. It took and I missed the long distance dry fly eat. I never saw these fish again. The chop was making it hard to spot fish over open water though and I would bet there were more opportunities there that I missed while focusing on the bank. I caught one more small brown trout on the ant a few minutes later.
As I continued down the bank I did not see any rising fish to begin with. Glade was occasionally seeing one down the bank out of my peripheral vision. I switched to the washing line rig on one of my other rods. I ended up picking up four more fish on this rig while slowly working my way down the bank. Two of them were brown trout that were literally cruising under overhanging branches on the bank. I spotted both in windows between the grasses and bushes and luckily made some good casts to lay my flies in their line. This was my best sub-session when I felt I got into a bit of a groove and made good casts and decisions. I ended this sub-session with six additional fish leading to a total of nine for the session so far.
I next moved to the highest lake in the chain. My beat had the left side of a rocky point and bent around to another submerged rock pile to its right. During my scouting time I spotted a few scattered rises on the left bank with a few more around the rockpile and in front of the point. The best congregation was near the point. The main issue was that the wind was at my back here and I would have to try to feed line to get a drift again.
The left side of my beat. Fish were occasionally rising along the color change at the edge of the shallow shoal.
The right side of my beat with the submerged rock pile.
I started the session with dry flies and chased rising fish around the point and the rock pile on the right. I caught one fish on the ant quickly and followed it with another on the shuttlecock a few minutes later. Once I had caught these fish, the rising stopped within short to medium casting range.
I moved to the left where I had seen a few fish rise during my scouting time. The wind had increased by this time though and the trout had stopped rising with the increased chop. I did a bit of blind fishing with dries and the washing line rig but did not get any interest from the trout.
I moved back to the point and switched my washing line rig to a dry on the top tag with two zebra midges below. I did get two takes to this rig but once again I set the hook and did not connect.
For the last 15 minutes of the session, I played the long game. There were fish occasionally rising 80-120' or more out over open water where the chop started. I made long casts to target those I could reach. For those I could not reach, I greased my line and leader and made the longest casts that I could. I then shook line out with the rod to try and feed slack into the system to dry and drift my flies to the fish. I did get one take with most of my fly line off the reel and backing showing clearly through. Unsurprisingly I missed the trout at this distance though. I was a bit bummed about leaving this sub-session with only two fish. I moved my last beat with 11 fish on the board hoping to finish strong.
I finished my last sub-session on Castellar Lake. This lake was the lowest of the group of three higher lakes. I had a beat to the right side of the outlet. There was some shallow water near the outlet. Then there was a solid weed bed between 20 and 40 feet from shore.
The center of my beat with the solid weed bed about 40 feet from the shore.
The right side of my beat where the weeds became more pocketed.
When I arrived, the sun was high and hot. There was a slight chop as well and no fish rising immediately. Glade and I identified two deeper areas among the weeds. My plan was to fish these areas with a deeper dry double dropper rig but be ready with the dry fly rod if rising fish began to materialize.
I began fishing the deeper pocket in the center of the beat. The wind slowed early in the session and kept my flies from drifting. As a result, it took me a few casts to realize that I had made my tippet too long and my point fly was sitting on the bottom. I trimmed some tippet and tried again. I was still too deep and hooked bottom on another cast.
By the time I had sorted this out I had wasted 10 minutes of a short hour-long sub-session. Once I had the depth sorted, I was not getting any takes on my midges below the dry like I expected. The trout had also begun rising sporadically as the wind eased.
While this was happening, Silva Sergio (Portugal) was catching a couple of fish in the beat to my left. Ollie Bassett was also catching fish from a steep hill in the distance to my right. I stopped to watch Silva and he appeared to be fishing dry flies to rising fish.
I moved to the shallow edge near him on the left of my beat to do the same. A few minutes later, a fish rose. I was able to watch its path for a split second before it disappeared. I covered it with my dry fly rig and it took my ant. I set the hook and quickly had my 12th fish in the net.
I stayed in this location for about 10 more minutes. I cast at a few more fish and had one blow up on my dry fly in the middle of the weed tops. I missed it.
For the last 10 minutes I ran to the right side of my beat. I soaked my dry double dropper rig here and hooked and lost a fish before the session ended. I was pretty disappointed with my last sub-session. The time I had wasted at the beginning could have been spent fishing either side of my beat or fishing a washing line rig instead of the too deep dry dropper I started with. It's possible I could have caught at least a few more fish to give myself a better chance at the session win. However, both David Arcay (Spain) and Pierre Kuntz (France) had gotten on a roll in the lakes above me in the last session. Pierre won with 18 fish, David had 16, and I finished in 3rd with 12 fish. It was a good effort but I would have liked to close the championship out a bit stronger.
Thankfully my teammates had a strong last session. Mike Komara finished 2nd on the Vicdessos River, Cody was 4th on the Tet River, Michael Bradley was 4th on the Aude River, and Jack was 17th on the Camporells Lakes. We had secured the bronze medal as a team. Michael Bradley had also narrowly missed an individual medal with a very strong 4th place finish. I ended in 18th individually.
Going into the championship, we knew it would be a tall task to beat the French team or the Spanish team they share a border with near where we fished. Our team fished very well together though and made the best of the information we had to work with. I'm incredibly proud of all of my teammates. We banded together and worked well as a unit. We were finally back on the podium for Fly Fishing Team USA at a world championship after having several 4th and 5th place finishes since our last medal in 2016.
It was great to add a 4th world fly fishing championship medal to my collection and represent the USA well with my teammates. It's time to get a new medal case again.
The team USA crew after receiving our medals. Pictured from left to right are Nick Ryzka-Filipek, Mike Komara, Cody Burgdorff, Jack Arnot, Devin Olsen, Michael Bradley, and Glade Gunther.
Before I end, I need to thank a lot of folks who made it possible for my teammates and I to not only be at the championship but be successful. Thanks to all of my former teammates who have built the foundation that has led to us achieving another medal and continuing to try and be the best ambassadors for the USA and the sport of fly fishing that we can be. The Europeans have a deeply embedded tradition of excellence in competitive fly fishing. It has been a decades long project to try and close the gap to the level of the top performing teams there. Thanks as well to Jerry Arnold for the many years of financial support that got us where we are now. While we supported ourselves financially this year, we could not have gotten to where we are without Jerry's previous contributions.
Thanks to the organizers of the championship for putting on a well-run event that must have taken an exceptional amount of effort. Thanks to the MAGs (moms and girlfriends) who helped keep our team fed and our accommodations taken care of during the championship. Thanks to Trouthunter for supplying the team with tippet. Thanks to Glade Gunther and Nick Ryzka-Filipek for all of your contributions as the team's captain and reserve angler. They put in a lot of effort daily to help us fish our best. Thanks to my teammates Cody Burgdorff, Jack Arnot, Michael Bradley, and Mike Komara for your efforts on and off the water. You are excellent anglers who deserve to be where you are. I am lucky to be the old fart on the team fishing with all of you. Thanks to my parents for introducing me to fly fishing and a love of the outdoors. Look at the craziness that those first family camping and fishing trips brought about. Thanks to my employees Joe, Justin, and Melissa for keeping Tactical Fly Fisher running well while I was away competing. Last but not least, thank you to my wife Julia and our kids for all the support you have given me through the years. They put up with my absence a lot for competitions, training days, and other trips abroad. Without their support I would be a much less fortunate man.
Until next year int he Czech Republic...I'm out.
Devin Olsen