It was 13 years ago when Karel came to Nové Zámky for his first time. That time he came to see national championship of Slovakia just to find out the way how to get to the city. Since that first travel Karel came to Slovakia almost every year, sometimes to Bratislava, sometimes to Povážská Bystrica up to 2013. The tradition of traveling to Nové Zámky started with another Karel (Světelský) that was preparing a training camp for children and watching casters during competition abroad.
Team of Jihlava planned to go there last year already but due to the complications team could arrive to Nové Zámky this year for first time. So Jirka and Tomáš was able to see the place and Adam with Petr could meet caster from different countries. Karel and Zuzana joined the team too.
A car of Jirka started the journey in morning already so they could enjoy popular thermal pools of Slovakia. A car of Karel could start after work. For that time Karel decided to ride without navigation as he drove to Nové Zámky many times. And this was why Karel followed banners with way to Žilina until the Žilina disappeared from next banners and there were only two other cities - Budapest and Wien. And so Karel was following highway around Petržalka and preparing others for Hungary border when close to Jarovce the met exit to highway D4. And really - exit to Žilina. And after a bridge over Donau river they met exit to Dunajská Streda following highway R7 and then it was decided not to follow Žilina anymore and go to Nové Zámky close to the border. So Petr could see popular Slovakian rivers like Váh or Nitra, sometimes he could see Ardeniae or white stork flying so close that nearly touched antenna of a car. And Karel was happy that he finnaly got others to Nové Zámky.
Friday evening was fine. Adults were sitting, drinking and talking, children were playing table tennis or something else on soccer field. Everyone was looking forward to cast in the morning. Karel and Jirka were so impatient that did not want to leave place. But at 2:00 am there was nothing to drink and so the went sleep.
This year the world cup consisted of only five events everywhere so pentathlon was prepared in Nové Zámky too. At the beginning all target event were prepared and all casted in general order - Ev. 1 - Ev. 3 - Ev. 4. Then fly distance and at the end spinning distance was prepared.
Boys had problems with fly skish. We know that we already know how to cast it but wind from right side disturbed us and fly often missed target flying aside, although the line was dropped correctly. But other casters had the same problem. From Czech boys U15 we had most points but we found out we had new competitor - Zétény from Nové Zámky. Last year he had problems to cast fly skish and this year it looked he trained hard. Full dry casts proved that. Just unlucky wet casts missing targets caused he had not more points but equal to Adam. A competition could start.
Adults were there too. Zuzana had 100 points again (for 9th of 10 competitions), Karel had also 100 point for a very long time. Jirka had the same result like during spring, the training break caused by shoulder problem was the reason why he could not train. Only Tomáš needed some kind of stress during casting. Maybe that was why he missed the first target. Then he missed no more :) For second time this year he had 95 points and we knew we should see him cast 100 points very soon.
During arenberg the same problem with wind. Boys are still not able to handle with it. But yes - this is why we participate so many competitions. We need to learn how to do it. Adam had two 6 and four 8 points. Summary of 84 points. And Zétény? Three 6 and two 8 points. Absolutely the same result, again. Both were leading the boys U15 ranking. Seemed to determining winner just between them two.
Petr was casting greatly. New technique of casting we had trained since a week ago, really helped him with the result until he got to left side casts. During first cast the line somehow tangled around reel. Luckily Karel was watching him so could help him quickly. But it took time and Petr got nervous. Finally everything was solved and Petr had one minute for last three casts. Somehow he casted second attempt at left side casting and ran for last two casts. Unfortunately hand did not want to listen to the head and first cast was slowed too much. Just 2 points. So Petr tried to calm down and performed the second cast and - reel bail jumped back. Zero.
But then the most important thing we saw - Petr is growing. What would end with tears weeks ago that was handled with head high. Result was great, just the last three casts were bad. Sheep happens. But so far we did not know Honza of Chropyně dealt with arenberg very well and was above us by 9 points in ranking.
Adult guys did bad at arenberg. Zuzana 92 points as well as Karel, even Jirka had troubles. And so Tomáš was best of us with his fourth best arenberg result of this year.
Skish. Spinning skish. Most hated event. And it is so simple. Just come, cast 20 times, hit target for 20 times and leave the event. Right? Yeah, it sound so simple. Reality is simple different. Especially with the wind. Watching plug flying in the wind and slowly moving from right part of target to left part just 20 centimeters in front of target, it was dangerous. Karel saw this at last target. Luckily he hit the target, unlike the someone others.
Adam was satisfied. The wind was bad and having 75 points was not bad. But Zétény had the same result! Again! Both had equal target loss. Fascinating. Distances had to determine the winner.
The time when boys U15 casted on spinning skish was really bad due to the wind. We saw it during Honza of Chropyně. Boy generally casting about 80+ points came with only 55 points. That was why Petr was very satisfied with his 60 points. Technique probably improved. We were missing only 4 points now to beat Honza.
Aaand Zuzana had bad time. For a very long time we did not see 75 points that she had there. A pity, she got low in women rank. Karel used is old rod and was happy he is able to control casts again. although bad wind he gained 100 points. Second in this year. And Tomáš ... disaster. But surprise of whole day - Jirka. 'Upon his this year average result of 50 points we expected something similar. Especially in the wind. And Jirka dealt wit tit and ad perfect 70 points, beating his last year personal record. Wow!
And time for distances.
What a difference between casting technique during training and during competition. Mostly we saw the difference while watching Adam. Like left hand would not listen. Worked too early or not at all. Well, 70 points is not bad but we knew he could cast more. A pity. And Zétény had 6 points more.
Petr did well, both casts over 40 meters. Remembering technique he performed best cast that is his second best cast ever. Had more than Zétény, although target loss was too big to beat him or Adam. Honza still deals with his young age and limits of his body.
With Zuzana we found something new how to help her technique. It was greatly working at training and also during casts in Zámky. But the head ... again. It was not so bad, second best casts in season but we somehow knew we could be better. Alena was better by just 1,3 meter so there should be improvement in the technique. We would have to check it again.
Karel moved himself at the end of list to be able to be with all other casters. So he did not have the best weather conditions but it seemed to be a problem. He did not pull out enough line from reel, he used shortened fly line under 15 meters... Someone should explain him how caster should prepare himself for competition. Like he should not lend his own equipment to boys as they still can touch the table and cut the line during casts :)))
Best at the end. Jirka was casting nice cast. Line was flying far enough, only falling earlier than we would expect. After casting we analyzed it and probably it would help if the right hand would do longer move. We will see later during our training. Sounds like the performance was not good but no - Jirka did his best result in his casting career. Perfect.
And Tomáš. By the way - Karel does simply not like his technique of fly casting and tried to change it several times, but Tomáš is a Celt doing everything by himself. During competition there were quite large loops that did not want to fly. We could not get over 45 meters. And so we tried to focus on simple steps that can be handled by stressed head. And it helped, next cast was longer. And the second was much longer. And the next one much much longer... and Tomáš was making the distance of casts bigger and bigger by each new cast. After five minutes we found out that even the small cast was better than any previous cast of Tomáš. And the best cast was 5 meters longer.
Yes, this was amazing experience...
And last event came. Unfortunately the wind was still changing its direction. Different direction at start, different direction at end of court. Hard to decide when to cast. Problem is that caster has only one minute for cast and sometimes it happens that headwind is there for the whole minute.
But Adam was not unlucky. First cast just secure one over 55 meters. We watched Zétény, first cast out of sector. So we prepared for second cast. A big power of Adam, cast over 60 meters. Zétény had 58 meters. Damn, we need at least 63 meters. Adam prepared for third cast. A much bigger power there, we did not event know he could cast with so big power. Waiting for the measurement... 61 meters. Well, 2nd place. Incredible fight that was won by Zétény. Adam was 2nd with 45 points above 3rd place boy.
We know Petr has problem with spinning distance. And Peter knows it too. So he wanted to make first cast secure. And he was successful, got to 40 meters. Petr started counting how many meters Honza would have to cast to be better than Petr. We needed to get second cast close to 50 meters. It was not such a good cast but we got over 50 meters. And the third cast even behind 54 meters. New personal record for this event. And 3rd place in pentathlon for sure. Honza had very nice last cast and over 50 meters but the loss from fly distance cannot be erased.
Zuzka did not cast bad, just second best cast, only Janka from Bratislava had more. But we know Zuzka knows how to cast more. Not this time, unfortunately. After casting we analyzed it and it seems that we know why. Will check it during training. So Zuzka was 2nd in pentathlon.
Karel was leading before spinning distance and tried to cast as long as he could. But when other casters reached 75 meters, Karel reached 10m meters less. Hard to say what to change. From first place he fell down to 4th place.
For Jirka spinning distance is the most problematic event now, because of his problem in shoulder. He was happy he could cast and get plug into sector. Finally he had result very close to 400 points in pentathlon.
Tomáš made it interesting for himself. First cast was one of the very far ones and dropped about 20 centimeters out of sector. During second cast the line broke. Nervous and knowing he had only last attempt, nothing good for mood. But Tomáš is strong man and got the third cast into cast. Thanks to it he got over 455 points in pentathlon for second time in his life. Just 1 point from his personal record. And he did beat Lukáš from Kroměříž, great.
It was beautiful competition again. But it took a lot of time. On the other hand... well, ceremony ended after 19:00 so there was no reason to go home. We stayed till Sunday. Friends from cadet category brought us something from market and so we could sit close to field even after to competition. Only a few guys stayed there with us but we enjoyed with them. Tomáš developed fun for youth and so all had what to do for next several hours.
We went to bed earlier. Still was what to talk about. But we were really tired.
During way home Jirka got an excellent idea. We moved south westly. And exceptional moment to see Gabčíkovo dams. First time in our life we were able to visit town Beš, renamed to Gabčíkovo in honor of Jozef Gabčík. And then we stopped and visit the dam. Not easy to step on glass niche and look down to 20 meters deep area.
We were lucky, a ferry came and so we could watch lock in action. Then we really needed to get home. For a while we were in Hungary and then we moved to highway to Bratislava, Brno and home.
We finished spring season. Continue in September.
