‘ANITA DOLMAN SKEENA ANGLER _- ROB BROWN History lesson HERE ARE a number of ways to the Lakelse Railway Bridge, The quick- est route is to take the trail to Herman’s Point, walk a hundred yards downstream, wade the river below the riffle Ed Chapplow dubbed “the Rock Garden,” then walk upstream to the spol just behind the leaning snag under which Ted Rawlins caught the best steelhead of his life, From there, you take a short, indistinct trail to the railway, then walk east on the rails for thirty minutes, can take the trai] to the Flats and wade the river to Upper Coldwater, then take the high water chan- tel to the Rail Bridge spanning Coldwater Creek, and walk the tracks from there, or stay with the river the entire way. Beware, this last vigorous brush whacking. on the run-down logging road. The road follows the contours of the valley until Bridge. Remains of the foundation of an old building are still there, ] had no Special reason for taking that route, but creeks -- Hai, Herman and a trio of anonymous, lesser streams -- add a musical accompaniment to with a sweet, musty fragrance in spring. fished waters, because the ways to the river arc longer. puddles, darting into the bush, then crashing about before re-emerging, white-tipped tail wag- look. In thirty minutes we were at Lower Coldwater. What to use? I rifled through my wallets and boxes, thinking for the umpieenth time that I must reduce the number of patterns I carry. Finally I opted for a Silver Brown, reasoning fry around the edges of the river at this time of year. I sent the minnow cut and swam it through like- ly spots. Nothing. I returned to where I’d begun and sent out a big floater -- an approach | always try but am never too confident with, in the absence of rises. Noth- ing. A muddierx, a Partridge and orange did as poorly as my other volleys but, as I fished through with the latter, I came to the numbingly brilliant con- clusion that ] was slanding on rocks; more rocks than were here the last time I'd fished this run. These were rounded, grapefruil-sized rocks that must have been quietly recruited by high water over the last few years. found in most of our rivers, The Lakelse has a large population that hatches Olice a year, as all giant stones do. When they are not hatching, the nymphs, some up to two inches long, spead their time routing around in the inter- stices between the bottom cobble, looking for un- fortunate smaller invertebrates. When they are not poking under rocks like pigs after truffles, Pteronarcys crawl out on top of the rocks and graze like herds of cows, a time that fish really appreciate. After thinking of rocks, stones and stoneflies, I then thought of Charles Brooks, that delightful in Alaska and his retirement in Yellowstone, be- came the world’s foremost fisher of big nymphs for big trout. To impersonate Picronarcys, said Brooks, meant deal lived, To this end, lhe wiapped twenty or more turns of medium lead wire on number two three X long hooks, then wrapped them in herl and shaggy wool, before binding them with wire. stone nyniphs live demand more thana heavy fly. So Brooks delivered his nymphs upstream on casts no more than ten feet out on a short leader at the end ofa full sinking line. it passed him on Its trip downstream, striking violently at its slightest hesitation, Because the water I was fishing was more glide than riffle, I was able to use a floating line and long leader, but otherwise I kept Brooks’ techni- que intact, ' My reward: seven big trout in (vo hours, We stand on the shoulders of others. Thanks Charles. There are longer, more scenic routes. An angler’ it peters out on the river a few feet from the Train’ it proved a good choice. The gentle sounds of the. The Hai Road and its branches tead to lightly’ Pawsomie pranced ahead of me, leaping over’ ging, to give me a what’s-taking-you-so-long. that there are usually lots of coho and cutthroat « iconoclast who, after spending his formative years ' one had to fish an impersonation where the real The heavy, boulder-strewn waters where the Brooks stayed focused on the end of the line as. approach involves some. Last week Pawsome and ] tried the other route; " walking overland from the Beam Station Road, | the trip, and irrigate the woods, imbuing them Rocks made me think of stones and stones made . tue think of stoneflies, in particular Pteronarcys . Californicus, those buge ponderous flies that are . TERRACE STANDARD: The Terrace Slandard, Wednesday, May 27, 1998 - C1 SPORTS 638-7283 First blood for ultimate fighter . By ANITA DOLMAN “IT WAS FUN, ” That’s the word from Adam Tarsey after his first official ultimate fight. Tarsey, a local sign language interpreter, won his match in Victoria over the Victoria Day weekend. The fights sold 1500 seats and hosted 30 fighters, At 6’2" and 225 pounds, Tarsey won over a | 5°9”’, 235-pound fighter with a second degree black belt in judo. “There's a lot of possibiilites for him to go pro,” says Tony Rutlidge, Tarsey’s coach, trainer and sparring partner. The Ultimate Fighting Championship was only the second-ever sanctioned fight of its kind in Canada. The sport has a very violent repulation, waich . may be due to the underground fights which continue to be held. Canadian rules for the official games say that — there is no kneeing, elbowing, kicking io ihe groin, gouging or fishhooking. “J'm not a violent person. I’ve never been Ina street fight in my. life.”’ ‘Tarsey, who is 26 years old, got interested in the sport about three years ago, when he moved to Terrace from East Vancouver and got in- volved in the local kickboxing club. “It felt good to me — really natural,” says Tarsey about his first contact with the sport, He and other ultimate, or shoot, fighters arc troubled by the violent image of the sport. “7’m not a violent person,” “Pve never been in a street fight in my life.’* He says that most people who are violent never get involved in the sport. ; “You're not going to came out here unless . you have a lot of respect and maturity,” he says. Ultimate fighting requires intensive training, © usually in a variety of fighting styles, from mar- tial arts to wrestling to kickboxing. Rullidge says if anyone were interested in ultimate fighting they would start out in kick- boxing and wouldn’t be invited out until he was considered ready. Tarsey hopes that the sport’s violent image will i iniprove as more satictioned fights are held. He is hoping that more people will come to understand the sport when it becomes an exhibi- tion game at the 2004 Olympics. says Tarsey. ULTIMATE FIGHTER Adam Tarsey shows Sparring partner Reger Bal what led him to win his first Ultimate Battle. Ultimate fighting is relatively. new to Terrace. The fights will be included under the title of pencracea, or full-submission wrestling. Tarsey, Rutlidge, and Roger Bal, who also’ trains with Tarsey, say the full contact, no- holds-barred fights are no more viscious or deadly than boxing. In a boxing match a fighter goes 12 rounds or until he is knocked out. ish the fight. But the trio point oul thal ultimate fighters | have the option of “tapping out.”’ By tapping three times on the canvass, fighters can declare a loss wilhout having to fin- Tarsey says this means the only reason a own pride, fehter would be seriously injured is due to his Olympic athletes visit kids at Terrace schools LOCAL KIDS will be getting les- sons from some sporting greats this week. Eli Pasquale and ‘Tom Petryshen will be visiting Terrace schools on Thursday as part of the Esteem Team tour across B.C, Bike racers hit high gear NORTHWEST _ bikers launched into their first shot at the B.C. Summer Games at full speed. Locals raced in five cat- egories at the Kona Sand Root Shoot on the Vic- toria Day weekend, Terrace racers took the win in three of the cate- gories. Adam Spensley took first in the juniors race. Kathleen Brandsma won the sport women’s and Kurt Grabinsky won sport men’s. Organizers were im- pressed with participation in the race, Forty-four people showed up to compete for . the off-road race, which was the first of four in the scason used to qualify racers for the Summer Games. ‘It’s a very technical | course,” race organizer Mike Christensen. “‘It’s single track with lots of tight twists and turns.’’ : Participants came to says The tour takes Olympic and world class athletes to elementary and secondary schools to teach students about success and overcoming obstacles. Pasquale was a member of Cana- da’s Olympic basketball program B.C.’s top time scorer. CYCLIST Adam Spensley was the juniors winner at the Victoria Day weekend bike race at Red Sand Lake. It was the first of four qualifying races for the B,C, Summer Games, He's planning to ride in all those qualifiers. for 14 years and was drafted to the Sealtle Supersonics in 1984 after finishing his college career as the University of Victoria’s top all- Tom Petryshen was a Light Weight wrestler for six years on the Terrace from Kitimat, Prince Rupert and Smithers. Sean Beeson, of Kilimat, won in the wunder-15 Cadet race, which took the title for most competitors, with 16 participants, Peter Krause, of Smithers, won the senior race. Canadian National Wrestling team and made it to the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. This is the Esteem Team’s fifth year of travelling to B.C. schools. The program hopes to provide stu- dents wilh positive role models. Local gymnast taking on world Brett has ticket to Australia By ANITA DOLMAN BRETT OVERTON can’t believe he’s ac- tually going to Austra- lia, The 22-year-old Terrace gymnast will be heading to the World Age Group Games there in October. He will be one of 15 Ca- nadians travelling to com- pele in three categories: trampoline, double-mini and tumbling. Overton, who competes in both trampoline and tum- bling, won the chance to go to World’s in the Age Groups qualifying compcti- tion in Montreal in early * May. He made # through qualifying but came up with a disappointing return at the National Championships the following week. “T think I used if all up at Age Groups tying to qualify,’ says Overton. But he doesn’t really mind not winning in his fourth trip to the Nationals, since his real goal was to make it to the Games. Overton started in gym- nastics at the age of seven. “Tl was a really hyper kid and my parents stuck me in gyinnastics,” says Overton. After exhausting the train- ing facilities in Terrace he tured to coaching. He currently coaches a competitive team at the gym where he trains in Kelowna, “They want to go to Na- tionals,’” he says. ‘They're doing really well.” , Not only docs he enjoy the coaching but it also allows ~ Overton to work around his training schedule. “l was a really hy- per kid and my Parents stuck me in gymnastics.” And he thinks be has a good shot at the upcoming Games. “Dve seen the competi- tion on tape beforc,’’ he says, “Basically I'm doing more stuff than the guy who came in fourth Jast time.” His particular sports are scared for both degree of difficulty and execution. He thinks his toughest competition will come from the Ukranians, Russians and French. Overton's plans already include working to qualify for the next Age Group Games, to be held in South Africa next year.