Rok Šparovec of Team Tie & Fly, CTS Ambassador in Slovenia, has won the 2020 Slovenian Fly Fishing Championships.
He shares his journey to become one of the best fly fishermen in Slovenia.
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It all started 8 years ago when I was introduced to competitive fishing in a regional league run by a group of local club members and at the time one of the best fly fishermen in Slovenia.
Prior to that I was just a regular youngster exploring my home river Sava. I started reading about fly fishing and putting a lot of effort in training for the competitions. I was able to try out CTS rods and later on be equipped with them as a CTS & Maven Ambassador. In 2015 I joined the nationals circuit and started gaining experience.
The next year I won the individual title on top of our team’s gold medal, and also had the privilege to represent Slovenia on the international stage at the Adriatic Danube Cup which I won.
In the following 5 years I’ve always finished in the top 3 while our Tie & Fly team has won 5 straight titles. In 2017 I became a member of the Slovenia National Fly Fishing Team and was on my way to the World Fly Fishing Championship in Slovakia followed by the next one in Italy. The results weren’t brilliant but not bad either. With all the experience I’d gained, I was ready for the European championship in Montenegro in 2019 which I finished in 4th place.
We did even better as a team and won second place. At that time Tie & Fly team member Luka Pesjak joined the national team. Sadly we could not participate this year since the championship was cancelled. 2020 brought us quite a few problems with all this COVID-19 fuss. We had to adapt the national championship to just 5 rounds but at the end it all turned out perfectly because I managed to win it again.
During all the competitions and worldwide travels I’ve had a chance to fish many different rods but my preferred choice is CTS.
Due to fish quantity demands in competition I mostly fish euro nymphing methods and the CTS Affinity X blanks have proven to be top notch. Casting accuracy and fish take sensibility are unrivaled. When I fish dry flies I prefer the older MX models with a tad slower action. There are also situations when we have to target other fish species and these rods can do it all!
The trout season is slowly coming to an end now and we are looking forward to hucho hucho fishing that has just started. The heavy guns are ready to swing some big streamers as soon as the rain stops and river levels normalise…
