It’s true that lightness and power are two words hard to combine on a fly rod ! So we asked Jérome Servonnat our casting master to see if the little revolution that goes around the Loop Cross S1 is worth or just a media buzz. 

This is during the EFFTEX exhibition with Benoît that we have met Christer (left pic) and Rickard Sjöberg, owners of the very famous Loop company. Loop is very well known for its innovative large arbor reels, and for sponsoring some of the very best flyfishing films (AEG Media, A Backyard in Nowhere, among others). We’ve had a very good contact with those guys, excellent flyfishers, very fun and with a lot of humour ! At this occasion they were presenting their new rod : the Cross S1. Because they said many good things about it, that this brand new resin thing is awesome, and because they’re cool, we’ve wanted to try it.

This is thanks to Hugues Bruyneel from TOF (thank you again !!) that we’ve had the opportunity to test those rods on the field. We’ve required two of the Flatsman series, developed for tropical purpose : a #8 weight, that should be tested on irish seabass, and a #10 weight. My pleasure will be to submit it to pikes !
Let’s get it started : the esthetic. The rod is sober, has an efficient look, and wears a mat finish that will tease the GLX classics lovers. The beautiful modern looking reel seat is composed of three metal sticks making a triangle arround the blank. We appreciate the ultra-light rings, very classy. A simple black cordura tube, a grey tissue cover sealed with the swedish flag, here is the Cross S1, typically in the Loop spirit : modern, cool, efficient. Just a small remark : a small swedish flag next to the rod signature would have given this little color touch that suits the cover so well. And also because when it comes to fishing, nature and environment, being swedish is surely something to be proud of.

It’s action time now ! The rod feels very light in the hand. We have this very nice impression that it’s lighter than we expected when looking at it. And the new 3M Powerlux resin has surely something to do with it. If you shake it a little bit, you will straight away see that it’s a powerful horse here ! In other words, being light is not incompatible with being a powerful #10 weight flyrod. (Second part later this week)