I've just started using a 9' 6" #7 Greys G-Tec after a 10' #7 Greys Platinum XD and I have been surprised at the difference it makes to bank fishing.
Definitely agree about the reduction in loading on the wrist and the ability to increase tip speed - and the resulting improvements in casting performance.
Too early to say if you would go as short as 9' as i do still like the length to avoid bankside vegetation on back casts. But then I do have a tendency to drop the tip on my back cast, something which I am looking to iron out this season.

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Andrew W

"Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets." Arthur Miller

The late great Dick Walker was an extremely competent fisherman and a professional engineer who dabbled with rod design. He reckoned that 9ft 3in was the optimum length for a fly rod and got Hardy to produce the hollow glass superlite reservoir rod which was a classic. I can remember as a young married man, with a huge £6,000 mortgage, convincing my wife that I just had to have one to make my life even more complete!!

To this day I use rods of 9ft 6in or less as my first choice probably because i was a "shiny ****" throughout my working life and find longer rods tiring on my wrists.

Tenet