Weight – 26lb 11oz
Catch – 18 Carp, 13 Roach, 8 Bream, 3 Rudd, 1 Perch
Weather – Mostly cloudy, light rain later.
Match – Lands End Winter League – Rd 8 - 24th overall, 5th in section
With what was likely to be a very tight finish in the league, there were a few nerves at the draw, because we all knew the importance of a good draw.
Pegs 72 & 94 were the ideal draws to virtually guarantee good points, but by the time I drew most of the decent pegs had already gone. Initially I wasn't too disappointed with peg 81, however this really was the section of death. Andy France on peg 72, who I fancied to win due to the wind blowing that way, Mike West (75), Tony Rixon (78), Anton Page (79) & Matt Tomes (83). Also past results from this peg has been very mixed and overall my peg has been the 2nd worst peg on the section over the series. So it wasn't going to be too hard to get points!
Martin Pettifer also in the top 7 drew peg 84 opposite, so together with Matt we could at least keep an eye on each other.
The problem with my peg was the sunken tree, weed (which I discovered later) and uneven bottom by the island. I decided the best approach was to attack the peg and try and pull carp into the area. At the end of the day I needed a decent points score and being negative wasn't going to help.
At the start micro pellet & maggot went at 6m and I started to catapult 4mm towards the island right of the tree and 14.5m at 11 o'clock to the left of the island.
Like everyone in the section I started on the short line, but could only pick up small roach & skimmers, whilst everyone else also had carp. I wasn't overly worried because this lake can go like that, I just hoped I would have a strong finish. As the day progressed everyone was getting ahead of me and come the half way point, I had 4 carp, plus some silvers and was probably last in section.
Throughout I had kept the 4-6 pellets going in to the island and noticed carp starting to move around. Initially started on a conventional 4x10 float, but the weedy bottom was proving to be pain, so I quickly set up a poly ball rig, so I could fish really tight to the island, which improved things I started to catch on double maggot or pellet. I wasn't catching quickly, but at least I was catching.
A couple of looks down the margin only produced a single carp and a perch, whilst the short line was a waste of time, because I could only get small fish. The 14.5m had only produced the odd fish, until the last hour when I started to catch nearly every put in, but deep down I felt it was to little to late.
As expected Andy won the section and the lake with 71-5, whilst Tony had 45-12 and Anton 33-9. Matt reckoned he had 14 carp, which seemed right, but ultimately he had 2 proper carp for this lake of 3½lb and he beat me by 2oz. I'm not bitter – honest.
Martin opposite had 16-15 for last in his section, so it was obvious we were at the wrong of the lake today – for the 2nd time! Really, not bitter & twisted at all.
To cap my day off my missus, Sue called 2 hours into the match, she has been visiting family in Bournemouth for a couple days. She was parked outside her cousins when some nutter in a transit van crashed into her car, pushing it 3 feet into a lamppost. Needless to say the car is a right off. The driver was arrested, because the coppers reckon he must have been doing 50-60mph down a residential road, although he tried to say his brakes had failed, which the police proved to be a lie.
As for the league I'm really disappointed to finished 9th particularly since I was 3rd after 6 rounds, but drawing the wrong end of the lake in the last 2 matches has proved my undoing.
1st Nick Collier 46pts
2nd Vince Shipp 42
3rd Rod Wootton 39
4th Garry Wall 36
5th Matt Tomes 34 (308-9)
6th Dave Hodgson 34 (214-4)
7th Nick Duckett 33
8th Mark Poppeton 32 (286-13)
9th Ken Rayner 32 (202-2)
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