By Tom Stienstra
Tom Stienstra is The San Francisco Chronicle’s outdoor writer. E-mail:tstienstra@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @StienstraTom
An 11-year-old girl from San Francisco turned the fly-casting world upside down last week. Nobody who has heard this tale can quite believe it.
At the U.S. National Casting Championships in Long Beach, Maxine McCormick finished fourth in fly casting accuracy behind only the world’s best, made the All-America team and bested the all-time women’s mark. That’s right, at age 11, she had the highest women’s score in history. She also broke seven junior national records in different events.
To put it in perspective, casters are scored in accuracy on a scale of zero to 300 in three events. Maxine scored a combined 289 in three events for fly accuracy. That tied for the fourth highest among all casters, no matter age, gender or past achievements.
Maxine’s 289 beat the all-time record for women, 286, set in the 1990s by Canada’s top champion, Brenda McSporran.
Maxine McCormick
Maxine on the McCloud River about to release trout
“So what happened is that 11-year-old old Maxine just scored higher than any female in the history of the American Casting Association and was only outscored by Steve Rajeff, myself and father Glenn by just one point,” said Chris Korich of the Golden Gate Casting Club.
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