With pools paid, it was down to Del to draw us some decent pegs and to be fair he did a sterling job. Pegs 1,21 and 27. Richard fancied 21, I was not bothered and left it to Del to decide who plumped for peg 1, thus leaving me 27 as my home for the day. We all seemed happy with our draws and set about thinking about how we were going to tackle it.
I had with me, 2kilos of corn plus a few tins if required. 4 pints of maggot, both 4 and 6mm fishery pellets and a kilo of the new margin mix.
I decided to fish maggot down both edges on top twos, left hand with pellet and the right side with margin mix as feed but toss-potting maggots over the top when I was going to go over it. My main line was hopefully going to be 2+2 with loose fed corn. I also set up a longer line to start the match on which would be fed with a cupping kit to start and toss potted corn and 4mm pellet. Rigs were .3 MW diamonds in 18inches to 2ft of water tied to .20 Stroft and a size 16 Pr36. Margins were floats with no name taking 2 no 8 Stotz to a size 16 Pr36.
At the all in I put 3 cups of margin mix and 2 pots of maggot down the right hand side, 2 pots of pellets and a pot of maggot to the left. Next door on 28 was already playing a fish. I threw a dozen grains of corn to 5m and shipped out a large pot of corn and 4mm pellets to 9m. I would start here.
A single grain of corn saw a couple of carp fall to the trap set, before it went a bit iffy, I started toss potting and a few more fish came to the waiting net. After a hour I had around 12 fish for 35lb. I had been feeding the 5m line regularly and it was time for a look. I was getting fish steadily for the next two hours in small bursts of 3 fish, then wait a couple of minutes then 3 fish again. I was sitting on 40 fish now and estimated I had done 100lb. I needed to keep up the catch rate as I could see 28 and 29 catching and Trevor Price on the peg to my right was doing ok.
Whether it was me pushing the peg too hard, or the fish just changing the way they were feeding, or simply the fact it had stopped raining. I started to foul hook a few fish and lost a few shipping back. I changed shotting to a bulk around 6inches from the hook and I was back into a few fish. The rain had also returned. I was soaked. I was picking a few fish off from around the bait table and by switching side to side I was putting together a good net. Hour four flew by and I was now into 55 fish for around 140lb.
Decision time, do I come off feeding slowly fish and try the edges or persevere.
I decide to have a quick look and if no bites straight away I would be back out. After 5minutes I was back out to 5m. I would see this through to the end. Again fish were coming steadily, all around the 3lb mark, but it was a waiting game. I ended up with 62 fish and was happy with my days fishing. I knew I was behind both 28 and 29 but would run the rest of the section close.
At the weigh in our section went. 88lb, 145lb, 172, Me 183, 236,223, and 188. So fourth in section. I was happy with that, I had caught well throughout with only a couple of dry spells. Another couple of fish and 3rd in section was possible.
Overall result
1st Andy Gregory 274lb
2nd Del Smith 260lb
3rd Dan Hardy 236lb
4th Colin Spencer 234lb
5th Hugh Crawford 223lb
6th Ricky Quick 199lb
Teamwise I think we won the day (awaiting confirmation), Richard won his section, Del was second in his and second overall, I was fourth in section giving us a total of 7 points on the day.
No comments:
Post a Comment