Born in San Francisco in 1959, Tim grew up about a mile and a half from the famous Golden Gate Angling and Casting Club. Tim’s father is of Russian decent and his mother Ilga was raised in Dresden Germany. Tim has a sister Laurie and a brother Steve. Tim now resides in Vancouver Washington with his partner Katherine Hart.

Tim started fishing at the age of five and followed his Brother Steve Rajeff into competitive fly and spin casting. While trying to cast better than his brother Tim won the world single hand fly distance championships in 1984 and also won the overall fly casting championships at the United States casting championships. Tim retired from competitive casting in 1986 to focus his efforts to help people become better fly casters.

Tim has worked in the fishing lodge business in Montana and Alaska and developed fly fishing on Ponoi River on the Kola Peninsula.

Tim started ECHO Rod Company in 2001 with his partner Katherine and a few close friends. Their company Rajeff Sports is the distributor for Airflo fly lines in North America. 

Tim still travels to fish many destinations around the world to test his latest rod designs. So if you see Tim on the river fishing you will see that he is hard at work