“If fly casting is about the rod loading/unloading, and therefore impulsing the line by transferring its potential energy to it… shouldn’t the Bow and Arrow cast be the distance technique of choice?”
The Technocrat
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onemorelastcast.net 
The answer might be yes. Years ago I was overhead casting a WF line with a 10 foot sink tip. I could raise the rod to the one o’clock position while the sink tip anchored the line in the water. When the sink tip broke free of the water, the rod was loaded for a good backcast. I could shoot the entire line on each forward cast. Same mechanics as a bow and arrow cast. The rod was 12.5 feet long.
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I don’t think that Bow&Arrow and overhead share the same mechanics.
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Maybe I should have said slingshot. The hand pulls the pouch back to load a slingshot. You could hold the pouch and push the slingshot forward to achieve the same result. The hand pulls the fly back to load/bend a fly rod for the bow and arrow cast. The water holds the sink tip to pull against the fly rod so it loads/bends for the back cast. It is not a perfect analogy but it resulted in effortless 100 foot casts.
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Bow and Arrow or slingshot are the same analogy, I got t.
But there is a fundamental difference with a proper fly cast: in a Bow and Arrow cast the rod hand doesn’t move, and that gives a very different result.
Ask a friend to hold the rod, with the whole line straight behind him on the ground. Hold the tip of the line and pull, bending the rod as much as you want. How far will the line fly?
I will try it myself. Thanks for your input.
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This study by Grunde and Jason is a must to understand this issue. What they found is that the potential energy stored in the rod accounts for around 20% of the final line speed. A Bow&Arrow cast uses the rod “spring” only, not its leverage:
http://www.sexyloops.com/articles/rodcast.shtml
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Thanks for posting. I understand it now.
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