On Mon, 28 May 2007 00:03:40 +0100, Derek Moody
wrote:



Book a casting lesson with your local instructor and ask him (when you book)
to provide a selection of rods and to suggest the best combination for your
physique and the local waters.


Excellent advice there.
Personally for bank fishing I'd never exceed 9'6" for rod length, and
a maximum #7 for all round performance - a #6 or even a #5 is most
often perfectly adequate, but can feel a bit overloaded if you do much
fishing with sinking lines.

I'd also never recommend using a #8 weight line with a #7 rod as a
matter of course. Some rods could probably benefit, but as often as
not I'd go the other way and 'underline' the rod. It's imperative to
test out all the possible combinations before settling on one
particular line rating as standard for your style of casting and that
specific rod.

The type of line used can have a bearing on this as well - I'm
referring to WF lines and not getting into the WF versus DT argument.
The length of the head and the various tapers can make quite a
difference to how the rod feels when casting.

Cheers
Ian D