23/07/11 - Fishponds

Weight – 239lb 6oz
Catch – 31 Carp
Weather – Mostly sunny and breezy
Match – Club – 1st out of 7

Only 7 for today’s afternoon/evening match, but I won’t be surprised to see a few more turn up for the next one. Fishing 2.30-7.30 see us fish the best part of the day.

8 pegs went into the bag, because I didn’t know which one to leave out, so decided to let fate decide. I found myself on peg 1, down the bottom of the arm and with the westerly wind blowing into it I fancied it for a few. In fact when I arrived I had a quick walk around the lake and it looked spot on for some big weights and I wanted to try and beat the current 5hr match record of 228lb (although I still hold the 6hr record of 218lb).

Only 1 pole rig was required to fish paste, left and right at the bottom of the shelf. I also set up 2 pellet waggler rigs to cast 30m to the far side.

After the 1st hour I had 5 fish all on paste. During the 2nd hour I noticed a few swirls over the waggler line and managed 1 carp, plus 4 more on paste. At this point the wind switched from a south westerly to a more northerly direction and the arm of the lake was now flat calm and the fish over the waggler line disappeared.

Another 5 fish in the 3rd hour, all on paste meant I was just keeping ahead of Chris on p3 and Tim on p22. During the 4th hour the carp started to show again over the waggler despite the flat calm conditions. It was best to wait for a bite (no more than a minute), but found a more visual 10mm white boilie was better, catching 2 fish on the waggler, plus 4 on the paste, including my best fish of 14lb.

The last hour was by far my best with 10 carp, 7 on the paste and 3 on the waggler. During the last 90mins I managed to pull away from Chris. Throughout the match I had fed a handful of 8mm every put in and kept pinging pellet over the waggler line meant I had the fish cueing up.

Ok there were only 7 today, however really pleased to have got the match record back, it’s the 3rd time. More importantly for me, it is a great confidence booster, particularly after what has been a difficult couple of months of fishing.

1st 239- 6 – Ken Rayner – peg 1
2nd 187- 0 – Chris Davidge – peg 3
3rd 150-10 – Marcus Harker – peg 12
4th 150- 4 – Tim Allen – peg 22