In the January 2012 issue of FF&FT I looked at one of Scott MacKenzie’s shooting head lines, which are designed and produced to suit distance-casting with all manner of double-handed Spey rods. Here, we have the rod Scott came up with specifically for casting these lines. So, as I threaded up up the 15ft Shooting Head DTX #10/11 married to the equivalent line (in this instance, a 44g DTX shooting-head floater) on a flooded river with a gusting, wild upstream wind, I wondered how it would perform.

The rod itself is stiffish, with most of the action in the top third, but with some reserve power lower down the blank. I would guess that this rod owes its action to a point someway down from the top of the family tree of Scott’s tournament distance-casting tools. However, this rod is far, far lighter, has much more ‘feel’ through the blank and is much more of a fishing rod than tournament casting ‘broomstick’. The handle is relatively short and uncomplicated – the cork has a straight taper down from a broad diameter cork at the reel-seat to narrow at the blank junction, and the rod's butt is stocky and bulbous to allow for bottom-hand control.

Finished in the MacKenzie dark brown and claret livery, the blank's action is pretty fast and thus timing is an important factor on how it delivers a cast. This makes it not the easiest rod to use, but when it is loaded properly and flexed with a crisp, firm, forward stop, then the line will fly impressive distances. Casting into the strong, upstream wind meant that a tight casting loop was essential, but easily achieved once the caster gets used to the action and timing. Fishing itself was virtually pointless (the gauge was at 6ft!) but I’d tackled up with a challenge in mind: 12ft of level leader and a conehead fly – both of which could cause problems in such conditions (too long a leader for too heavy a fly in too strong a wind). Turnover was surprisingly good with this clumsy outfit, which bodes well for other systems and heavy flies. If anything, I felt that this floater need a poly-tip adding to the end to anchor the line more firmly and make this rod load just that little bit more for peak Spey-casting performance.

From the bank, in the high water, and into this beastly wind the rod performed Circle C casts and Double Speys with aplomb, picking up the fly line very easily, with Spey-cast deliveries from angler to fly measured at well over 40 yards. One feels that in ideal conditions (say, a light, downstream wind and a clear bank), then this could be improved upon by a long, long way.

Make no mistake, this is a rod for where distance is the object. It’s a good, balanced fishing rod in the hand, but it is designed for Spey-casting across huge, wide rivers such as lower Spey, Tay, Ness, Eden and the like, and brawling Norwegian or Russian flows. For those who want to invest in distance, then this is a gilt-edged opportunity, but it comes at a premium.

There are four models, ranging from a 12ft 8-weight to the 15ft 10/11-weight.