Mathias Lilleheim
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Mathias grew up among deep fjords, steep mountains narrow valleys, imposing glaciers and fantastic glacier green salmon rivers on the north western part of Norway. Fishing, and then fly fishing, became an obsession already at an early age. His other passion, javelin throwing, eventually led him to sports science education and a full time job at the Norwegian Olympic Training Centre (where he still works today). Injuries resulted in an early retirement from competitive javelin throwing, but fly fishing (and fly casting) was already there to save him from boredom. Mathias has been National Coach in Casting (distance and accuracy events with specialized fishing equipment) for more than 20 years, but his own competitive career has been in Fly Casting (using normal fishing equipment for fly fishing). He has several gold medals and national records in Norwegian championships, several medals in international competitions all over the world and two silver medals in the only official World Championship in Fly Casting that was arranged in Ireland in 2006. |
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From coaching athletes in Casting he gradually transferred into teaching fly casting to fly fishers. He developed his own principles and his own system based on direct feedback, effective communication and careful progressions. This system has, for more than 10 years, been used by the Norwegian Hunting and Fishing Association to educate fly casting instructors all over Norway and is still used today. His has written two books about fly fishing: One almost autobiographical one called “The Perfect Cast” and one about learning fly casting called “zzzzzzzAP”. Mathias Lilleheim joins ArcticSilver as Product Development Manager and the Free-Flex System is taken into thoroughly physical examination by Mathias and his team. |
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