AS the competitors in the 2016 Flycasting World Championships arrived at their hotel in Nelijarve, Estonia, some noticed a 12-year-old girl jumping on the hotel’s trampoline.
The girl, Maxine McCormick of San Francisco, was not a tourist. She was their competition in the biennial championships of this niche sport, in which the world’s best handlers of flies and rods test their skills in a series of accuracy and distance competitions.
According to an article in the New York Times, Maxine trounced every other woman in the competition’s most popular event, trout accuracy, in which competitors cast into a series of rings. Her score was also higher than those of all the men except one: her coach, Chris Korich. She also placed third in the salmon distance event, using back muscles honed by hours of tree climbing to propel her line 127 feet.
“She’s the most efficient fly caster on the planet,” said Korich, who has been coaching Maxine since 2013. “I don’t know anyone in history that can claim to be better.”
Last weekend, at 14, she defended her accuracy title at the world championships in England with a score of 52 in the women’s division — 21 points clear of the second-place finisher. She also won the salmon distance category.
You can read the full story HERE.
