‘America’s Casting Princess’ leads winners home

The U.S. national flycasting team returned to America late last week from the world championships in England — but 14-year-old Maxine McCormick’s feet might not have touched the ground.

Maxine won two gold medals and a silver. In Europe, some called her “America’s Casting Princess.”

The U.S. team, filled with flycasters from the San Francisco-Oakland Casting Club, dominated the world stage against competitors from 20 countries. The Americans won gold medals in five events, plus six other medals. Casters use rods similar to those by anglers who fly fish for trout, and then, in timed events, cast to floating rings, in this case, amid 20- and 30-knot winds with gusts to 50.

Maxine attracted media members from across Europe and North America as the youngest world champion in two events, women’s trout accuracy and salmon distance. She also set a world record by casting 161 feet in a qualifying round for sea-trout distance, and then won silver in the finals. Anne Hedman of Sweden edged her by one foot.

“Just amazing, stunning style,” said U.S. coach Chris Korich, who is based with the Oakland Casting Club. “Maxine stunned everybody, including her coach, to pull it off. She won it with laser beam casts, daggers in the wind.” Maxine called the salmon distance “my favorite distance event.”

Other American winners were from the SF-Oakland Club: Perennial world champ Steve Rajeff won the men’s gold medal for trout accuracy, and silver for sea-trout distance; Larry Allen, in the senior division, won two gold medals, a silver and a bronze; Maxine’s dad, Glenn McCormick, won a bronze; Donna O’Sullivan, who is credited for first spotting Maxine, then just 9, at the Golden Gate Casting Ponds, won a bronze.

The five gold medals won by the U.S. team led the competition. Norway and Sweden, each with more than twice as many qualifiers, won four.

Rajeff said Maxine’s golds brought back memories of when he first dominated the sport in the 1970s. “It made me think about my first world distance title won in England, way back in 1972 at the age of 16,” Rajeff said. “Wow! Maxine just did it at 14.”