Rio is a company that
won’t stand still. Nearly every other month I get a press release from
them regarding a new design, a new taper, or a new idea for how a fly
line, leader or accessory should be made. They are working hard to
be an innovator and are among a small handful of companies that really
understand how to make fly lines that are usefully specialized. Last
year, at the Fly Fishing Retailer Trade Show,
Rio introduced the
Rio
Gold, a fly line billed as “A revolutionary taper design [that] allows
tremendous loop stability at distance and a unique weight distribution
[that] loads a rod at close range for easy casting.”
Reviewing fly lines isn’t
easy and the only way to sort the wheat from the chaff is to live with the
line on your favorite rod for a season and see what it does. That’s
exactly what I’ve done with the
Rio
Gold. I spooled the line on my favorite reel and proceeded to use it with a
multitude of 5, 6 and even 7-weight rods in both fiberglass and graphite.
I’ve been fishing this line since October of 2007 and I’m here to tell you
that Rio has a winner. This is a quality fishing tool at a price that is
in line with premium offerings from any of the industry’s biggest names. With a
suggested retail of $64.95 it’s not an inexpensive line, but it’s one you
may want to invest in if your style of fishing includes constantly
changing conditions that demand control and versatility.
The Rio Gold is an
aggressive weight-forward design. According to the Rio web site, the
Rio
Gold weight-forward floating fly line has a 47-foot working head length with 43-feet of running line. Its
specs indicate that the first 30-feet weigh in at 146 grains. AFFTA
standards define a 5-wieght fly line as being 140 grains for the first
30-feet (less the level tip of the line) plus or minus 6 grains. By that
definition the
Rio
Gold is a 5-weight line living on the upper end of the
scale. But the other half of the story is also told in Rio’s specs (which
are far more complete than that of most manufacturers – thank you Rio!).
According to the same table, the Rio Gold in a 5-weight specification will
tip the scales at a chunky 228 grains for the full 47-foot head length. That’s the
equivalent of an 8.5-weight line, but not to worry as that's exactly how
fly lines work. I'll bet you didn't know your 5-weight rod really
likes 8-weight lines, did you?
We don’t cast sections of
line – we cast the line from the leader back. With this in mind, the
Rio
Gold is definitely heavy in the first 30 feet if you’re looking for
an AFFTA standard 5-weight. I weighed the line and found the length
described by the “color change between the head and the running line
[that] makes it easy to find the perfect load point for each cast” is just
over 160 grains. The color change is
somewhat subtle and it’s tough to say exactly where the transition
takes place. In bright light I settled on 32-feet. The shade
transition continues beyond this point, but this is where I saw a
noticeable change in color. I used an Umpqua spring
fly line scale for this measurement, and later confirmed the results using a Digiweigh digital
scale, which read 166 grains inclusive of the level tip. Thus the
length of line Rio suggests be left out of the rod tip to load the rod is
a perfect 6-weight. When I cast this line with my Orvis
Far-and-Fine, a 7'9" soft 5--weight, I found the rod to be overloaded at
anything over 25-feet. A 4-weight Rio Gold would likely have been
the better choice for that rod. This isn't a line for rods that are
conservatively rated, but even then it might be a good choice if you're
fishing a lot inside of 30-feet in small creeks or on pocket water.
Weighing the first 47-feet of the
line, the Digiweigh read 204 grains, a near perfect 8-weight load. This
is about the amount of line you’d aerialize during a big cast, perhaps
shooting an additional 20 to 40 or more feet of line on the release.
Clearly Rio was thinking about contemporary fast-action rods when they
designed this line. Most of those high-speed sticks are under-rated
and
Rio’s built a well-designed line for them! It was a very good match
for my Redington RS4, which is described by the manufacturer as a "fast
action" 5-wieght fly rod
(read
our review of the Redington RS4 here).
This line would also be a great match with other fast-action rods from
Sage, G. Loomis, Orvis and others.
Just in case these
numbers concern you, this level of weight increase is normal in a fly
line. What's different is the nature of the weight distribution. In
comparison, a spot-on 5-weight double taper weighs 140 grains in the first
30-feet. If you false cast 45-feet of line, then you're loading your
rod with close to 230 grains or roughly the same mass as 30' of a 8-weight
line. What the Rio Gold does differently is spread that mass into
something akin to an elongated bullet to more efficiently use the energy
of the cast by minimizing flight instability and maximizing power
transfer. Their design works as claimed.
So what does the Rio fish
like? It’s good. Very good. The line floats high and the
tip doesn’t
sink. That, in itself, is a great improvement over most lines,
which annoyingly tend to ride under the meniscus for the first two
or three feet (and sometimes more) making for sloppy mends and sluggish
pick-ups. Rio's design engineers have done
a marvelous job with this line, it picks-up and rolls out with an
impressive level of precision.
The Rio Gold's coating is
appropriately slick. Shooting is easy and the line isn’t going to be
the limiting factor in casting. If you’ve got the chops you can cast this
one to the backing. In direct comparison to an Orvis Wonderline+
Trout, Cortland 444 and Scientific Anglers Mastery, I found the Rio to be
subjectively indistinguishable in surface feel. In short, all the
new lines are pretty darn slippery! The color change did mark a very good
pick-up point and the line behaved like the well-balanced weight forward
design it is during long casts. With softer glass rods I found I
had not only great distance performance, but very good loading
characteristics with as little at 10-feet of line in the air. This
line is a stone-cold-perfect match for both my
McFarland
8-foot 6-weight and my
TL Johnson
8-foot 5-wieght!
Rio says "The long back
taper is excellent for mending and for roll and single handed spey casting
and the color change between the head and the running line makes it easy
to find the perfect load point for each cast." In my hands the Rio Gold
isn't the world's roll-casting champ, but then again it's not a double
taper line. It's a weight-forward design. I found that I could comfortably roll-cast about 35-feet
of fly line using a 9-foot rod. When you factor in a 9-foot leader,
this is a 44-foot roll cast. Under almost all real-world fishing
conditions this is more than adequate performance and is excellent from a
line that can replace a bass bug taper. Experts may be able to squeak
another 10-feet from a roll cast, but if I know long roll casts are part
of the day's game I'll opt for a double taper. My skills are
mediocre at-best when it comes to single-handed spey-style casts, but the
Rio Gold performed both a snake roll and single spey as cleanly as any
line I've cast before and far more efficiently than any bass bug taper or
short-head line I've used. You'll have no problems with
change-of-direction casts on moving water.
So far I've fished the
Rio Gold with tiny nymphs and split-shot under an indicator, presenting to the
demanding Cumberland River trout population. I've fired countless Clousers into the
rocky smallmouth creeks of Ohio and Indiana. I've cast size 18 dry
flies on spring creeks and size 8 bluegill poppers on weedy ponds.
And I've spent a full day heaving everything from 3-inch-plus rabbit strip
streamers to size 16 soft hackles into a swollen and uncooperative Bow
River. I've used the Rio Gold in air temperatures from 20 degrees to
90, and in waters from wet-wading-warm to shockingly refreshing (which is
a subtle fly fisherman's code for a leak in the waders). In every case it has been
well behaved and high performing. The welded loop is still in use;
in my experience this is typically an early casualty and almost all my
other lines boast a nail-knotted mono stub.
In short, this line has
done everything I've asked of it and it's come through with highest marks.
It doesn't exhibit annoying memory in the cold, and it retains its
character when things warm up. I especially like this line for presenting
to smallmouth in mid-sized creeks. It's quite a bit more stealthy than a
bass bug taper, but a lot more commanding than a "trout" weight-forward.
It's a great "all-purpose" floating fly line, especially for the Midwestern warmwater
angler. Match it directly to a fast action graphite cannon, or
select one line size down for slow-action rods in grass, glass or low modulus
graphite. The Rio Gold is a premium line and it deserves the title.
Highly recommended.
