If anything moves a caster to the top, it is definitely intense training. One of the best training sessions held in Czechia is organized by Kroměříž castings club. Only a few clubs have trained as many members of Czech team as Kroměříž as been able to do.
When Karel participated the training camp in Bransouze with Kroměříž, he learned a lot about training, about technique. His first 100 points results were casted there. Since that time he tries never miss the camp any year. It helps him to have nice pentathlon result time to time.
That is why Karel take boys of casting Jihlava with him to camp and improve their results. Also this year Jihlava casters did not miss the camp in Bransouze. This year all came there, except for Tomáš.
Each of Jihlava casters had his challenges for every day. It was about 17 challenges, divided into 5 events. At least one challenge on targets had to be done to allow caster cast distance events.
Training was planned as 3-phases. Three hours in the morning, three hours in the afternoon, two hours in the evening. It was not only about casting, there was also floating fishing training and spinning fishing.
Reality often differs from the plan. Boys work hard with such intensity that after afternoon training almost no one wanted to caste even in the evening. Also Zuzana and boys of Kroměříž were disturbing the plan as there were spinning fishing and were catching fish. Jihlava boys wanted to catch fish too. Based on their hard and intensive training during day Karel allowed the fishing in the evening.
First day the effort was really huge. That also showed us the weak and strong sides of each boy casting. Honza had very weak fly skish but Petr was able finish everything there. On the other hand Petr was very weak at spinning skish and there Honza had no problem. Adam did not finish only one challenge and Vojta finished everything.
What boys did not finish in the morning that the wanted to finish in the afternoon. That was why nobody wanted to cast in the evening. But evening training was just voluntary so boys played table tennis or went fishing. Karel could take care of preparation of Zuzana for world championship.
Second day Honza finished all challenges of fly skish plus at least one advanced challenge at arenberg and spinning skish. Petr tried too, all finished on fly skish again arenberg finished too and at least one challenge at spinning skish. Thanks to that he was allowed to cast fly distance where he tried to cast with the same rod which is being used by Vojta. And we could se Petr could handle this rod, finishing all challenges for fly distance.
Vojta and Adam had no problems at all, finishing all challenges and the same performance at fly distance. They even went cast spinning distance in the evening. Nice performance too.
After three days of intense training slowing down. Boys were asked to make a control check on target events in two rounds. Aim was clear - checking how the training affected the target loss.
As expected, Honza and Petr were around 100 points of target loss. Honza loosing at fly skish, Petr loosing at spinning skish. One round was better than the second. Best of Honza was 96, best of Petr was 89.
Average loss of Adam was about 20 points from each event. Best control check was only 42 points so average target loss even 5 points improved. Vojta made 51 points of target loss in first check. During second control check he did fantastic improvement and did results 95-100-90 that was only 15 points of target loss. Zuzana did the check too and in all checks she had 9 points of target loss.
After check time for free training provided. Petr and Honza spent most time at fly skish, Vojta and Zuzana moved to fly distance and were challenging each other who cast more. With his distance Vojta forced Zuzana to perform the best of her technique and so Zuzana had casts over 50 meters. And Adam tried to set up his new records in "points up to first zero" challenge. He did it at all three target events.
Fifth day it was necessary to relax so Karel planned a trip. We spent a lot of time of destroying upper limbs so it was time to also destroy the lower limbs for balance. The trip was also intensive. Walk to Brtnice behind hill, buying an ice cream and walk back. Coming to camp just in the time. Lunch time...
In the afternoon we did another control check via group competitions. There were fighting groups Honza-Karel, Zuzana-Petr and Vojta-Adam. That day we saw improvement of Peter, target loss smaller than before. Honza again below 100 points of target loss. Adam and Vojta both around 50 points.
The last training day checking the reason for missing target casts and another free training. Boys used it mostly for fly distance training.
In the afternoon we visited fishing shop in Třebíč and bought spinning lures and other stuff that boys used just when we came back to camp. Honza during the time had a competition in floating fishing. Started with hooks such big that Jirka said that three worms on such a hook look like on desolated island. Then Matěj was nice and gave Honza a few smaller hooks. Thank to Matěj Honza placed 2nd position.
And the last day of camp - Cup of Horácko. A test what boys and Zuzana improved during camp.
And Zuzana started amazing - 300 of 300 possible points on targets. Then a pity, Zuzana casted during wind-less time. Dreaming about 500 points was not within reach. But Zuzana fought for it and best cast of spinning distance was behind 70 meters. We were not sure if it was enough or not... and then the final result - 499.68 points. Best result in her life. But a disappointment. Only 32 centimeters to 500 points :(
The competition was not good for Vojta. Well... fourth best result in this year. Bad luck on arenberg and skish. Fly skish was Vojta's best in year, perfect. Fly distance for third time over 100 points (almost without wind support) and his best spinning distance in this year. But after his performance in Štoky this one was worse.
As Vojta failed on arenberg, Adam had the same problem. Fly skish same result as Vojta. But then spinning skish and Adam was like a wizard - his first 100 points! In summary this was his best target loss, even 1 point better than in Štoky. Going on with fly distance and for second time Adam got over 45 meters. But this time he stayed calm and so best second cast was just and half of meter shorter. Thanks to this Adam had his best fly distance result ever. During spinning distance Adam casted his second best cast in his career and for third time in a row behind 60 meters. Finally, this was new personal record of Adam in pentathlon - second time over 440 points.
Although Honza has not the best fly skish and first round of wet casts were all out of target, he fought and second round was almost all hit. Fought more. Arenberg third best. Skish same as his best skish result ever. Then fly distance. Just once in his life Honza got over 40 meters. But during this cup he got the fly over 45 meters and for his first time he had fly distance result more than 80 points. During spinning distance Honza got over 50 meters for third time and only and half of meter before 60 meters line. Thanks to this massive improvement Honza got over 400 points in pentathlon for his very first time. Unbelievable improving his personal record of pentathlon by 51 points. Unbelievable improvement of a boy casting just second year...
But this time Petr had to be "the last but not least". Twice he got over 350 points. Great result for a boy starting the same time like Honza. But Petr was showing big effort and so big improvement in almost everything. Karel was very curious how Petr end the cup. And it begun well, second best result of fly skish. Then Petr showed his power. Best result on arenberg, improved by 12 points. Best result on skish, improved by 10 points. His best target loss - 59 points.
With Vojta's rod Petr was better in Štoky and also there, in Bransouze. During competition Karel heckled Petr to maximum performance and Petr got over 50 meters for his first time. With the second cast closely to 50 meters Petr could get over 100 points in fly distance for first time. Amazing... Improvement by 16 points. And then his second best spinning distance.
A miracle. New personal record. 421 points. Improvement by new 69 points. 421 points after nearly two years of training...
We could see that Bransouze helped Jihlava casters again. Not so much to someone, very most to most casters. But it of course could not be done without such an effort boys and Zuzana put into the training. After their very intensive training they got what they deserved. Great.
So we would like to thank MRS Kroměříž that we could spend time with them and hopefully we will come again next year.