Well I'm finally taking the plunge as righty and learning how to cast off my left shoulder with my left hand up. After reading so many threads shaming cackhanders and 10 years of weird backhand solutions to wind problems I figured it was finally time, even if there are not many steelhead to be swung this year.

I've so far just been tossing my Meiser 15 footer and Gaelforce 54' and it's coming along more quickly the past few sessions. Probably 30% of my casts could maybe fish. I'm also using the Echo practice rod quite a bit at home for some muscle memory work. Seems to be helping break through the awkwardness.

Just thought I'd ask the experts and the experienced what helped you the most when learning to cast with your off-hand?

Overhand lawn casting to get forward casting stroke stronger. Brisk and high stop on back cast prepare to good Spey back cast stop which change D-loop to V-loop. High stop makes Drifting essential and Drift is good for forward cast. Oval casting which you can do on lawn too and it improves Spey back cast where rising inclined sweep plane is good. You can turn casting direction when doing continuous Oval casting which prepares you to Single Spey back cast sweep if you have enough room around you. Short Scandi is good for lawn casting practice because line loop runs smooth but lawn can wear line so can use whatever old line. Roll casting in water and then oval casting slowing down back cast until line anchors and it turned it to a Switch cast.

Esa

Definitely patience......it will come as long as you keep at it.
It’s a little like the question “how do you get a steelhead on a dry fly?”
By being patient and fishing a dry fly hahah

I'm not familiar with oval casting, or maybe I know it by a different name. Overhead is a great tip and I should be doing that with both sides for sure.

Good stuff. Whatever the motivation - I think it will simplify your angling meaning you might find yourself doing single-spey casts and nothing else.

Practice...

Yes, patience! If you can manage it - slow or still water is best for obvious reasons - one thing to try is do a cast right-handed and then immediately switch and do it left handed trying to mirror the other cast. Rinse and repeat. This will probably help you get the form more quickly, but the muscle memory part is just chemicals in the brain (not of course in the actual muscles) and takes time.

I dig Snakes tho

One of my favorite casts too - but just the one I can't seem to get right from both sides.

Thanks again for the overhead idea. Wow. I've just been doing it with the practice rod for a few minutes and I can already tell it's going to be a big improvement.

One step forward, two steps back tonight! haha. At least with the snake. I probably have a bit of fatigue going on. Switch/singles feel ok most of the time. I think just practicing the pull back with a broom stick would even do the trick. I'm going all crooked on the pull back and forward stroke. Worked a bit on mirroring the other side.

Don’t pull back with the top hand but rather think of it like you are pushing the rod tip back with the bottom hand. Top hand never going past your ear at the very most top hand rises...no pull ball back

Oval cast is current name. Also Belgian cast is used. Oval cast was called Underhand cast which is obvious begause back cast line loop travels under hand but then later Göran Andersson named short line Spey casting as Underhand and it spread so an Oval cast name was invented and it defines it very well when rod tip path is oval.

Esa

Also made famous by Lee Wulff

A lot of the nuances of long line casting technique are acquired over time, there is just too much to comprehend all at once. Information overload! DVDs offer many advantages, techniques of the masters, so to speak, little tidbits from each, absorbed, imprinted, one at time, over time, on the river with a $*** load of intense thought put into each cast.

And while doing all that, you may as well be multi tasking, fishing, & thinking where would Mr Steelhead be, & why, & how to I get my fly in the zone?

I'll tell you what helped me the most with non-dominant side casts, it was (for some reason) actually looking at the rod tip through the whole casting cycle.

Sometimes I try to imprint on the non-dominant side of my brain by facing down stream and alternating switch casts from one side to the other, without shooting line. Sometimes I'm switching hands while the head is still in flight! That's fun.