ICAST 2011 Sneak Peek | New Product Showcase Preview
Posted by Jason Sealock on Wed, Jul 13, 2011 @ 12:42 AM
Well we got our first glance at the new products at ICAST tonight at the New Product Showcase. We spent two hours going through hundreds of lures, rods, reels, accessories, terminal tackle and more to get a feel for what's new this year and where we need to direct our efforts as we make the rounds through the show floor the next three days.
Here are some initial thoughts on a few of the most popular categories of fishing tackle based on just a couple hours moving through all the new stuff.
Rods
This is probably our favorite category of new products this year. Several companies came with it this year on new designs, lightweight and afordable options. Just a quick list of new rods we found to be pretty cool that we'll be bringing you more information on are the new Duckett Micro Ice, the new St. Croix Rage, the new Abu Garcia Villain, the new Phenix Bass Assassin, the new Daiwa Aird, the new Okuma Helios, the new Airrus and some others we'll get to as well.
Reels
Another good category of new concepts and improved technologies came in the reel department. From lightweight Abu Garcia MGX Revo reels to interesting technology developments like Drag Tracking Technology on the Ardent Edge and the T Wing line guide on the Daiwa T Wing reel. There were several new reels we liked including those as well as the new Shimano Chronarch at $199, and some sweet new models of Lew's reels including the MG wide spool editions in three classes of reels and an inshore reel. We're excited to see what the XO hype has been around the Quantum new reels. They purposely left their reels out of the New PRoduct Showcase to build more suspense about what they are calling the most exciting release of products in their history. More to come on that and all the new reels starting Wednesday.
Lures
There are a lot of great new baits in the lures category. However as a whole, the new offerings were a little light in comparison to year's past. Still we found a bunch of companies we'll be spending time with over the next several days as our curiosity is peaked on a bunch of stuff. There are new soft bodied frogs from Jackall, Strike King, Evolve, Matzuo, Designer Fishing Lures and probably a few others we missed. There are several swimbaits as has been the trend the last few years at ICAST. Lucky Craft had one the most interesting swimbaits. We're anxious to see more about it.
Other Tackle
Lots of cool little tackle gadgets to help ease some of the pains of fishing. We liked the new Diamond Pegs from Eco Pro, the new Centro FastTach weights, VMC Spinshot hooks, Trokar treble hooks, and lots of other lines, accessories and more that we'll be bringing the next several days.
The lighting is hard to deal with in the new Product Showcase so we'll be able to really get good looks at the products starting Wednesday morning. So tomorrow should go a lot more smoothly with updates and sneak peaks on all the products you want to see from ICAST. Check back often throughout the day and evening Wednesday, Thursday and Friday for lots and lots of tackle talk.
For now I hope these teaser photos will at least quench your thirst for new product until we can get around and see everything and get the skinny on what seperates each product from the next.
But it's going to be another good show with lots of cool stuff to see.
