Catch - 9 Skimmers, 3 Roach, 1 Perch
Weather - Cold north easterly wind, cloudy with sunny periods
Match - Silverfish League - Last round - 12th out of 17 (3rd out of 6 - section)
Going into the last round I thought I was lying 2nd, but a miscalculation meant I was actually lying 4th and about 4lb behind Chris Fox in 3rd. 5th place was about 15lb behind me, so barring an absolute disaster I was at least guaranteed 4th place, which was worth £90.
Ideally I wanted to draw an end peg or one in a gap between the islands to give myself the best chance of improving on my position. Sadly p6 wasn't what I wanted, plus the cold north easterly was blowing straight into me. Either side of me was Tony Rixon on the end peg 5 and Ray Wickham on p7, with a spare peg to his left.
If I wanted to catch Chris I really needed some proper skimmers and to be honest I wasn't that optimistic following a frosty week and the wind today was going to make presentation difficult.
On the all in 2 balls of groundbait was fed at 13m, plus micros/groundbait at 13m to my left. Starting on a micro cage feeder, I had a micro roach on my 2nd cast, followed by a hand size skimmer 30mins later on dead pinkie.
Fortunately after the wind dropped a little after an hour and switched to the pole, but struggled for a bite. Because I was looking for skimmers, I kept both swims topped up, with groundbait and micros, moving out to 14.5m, fishing either double dead pinkie or maggot. The good news was the tiny roach population didn't bother me, nor did the proper skimmers, as I only caught hand size fish, although I did manage a near 1lb perch on the feeder, which was helpful.
With 90mins to go I concentrated mostly on fished 4mm expander in the hope of snaring one of those proper skimmers and at one point thought I might have a good finish as I netted 3 hand sized skimmers in a short space of time, but it wasn't to be, as they soon disappeared.
I really struggled today from what was on the day a poor draw and disappointed to finish the series on a low note. However, I am pleased to have finished 4th overall, picking up £90 in the process.
Overall the series went reasonably well, with a 1st and 2nd overall, but mistakes in the 2nd round cost me a higher result. I am certainly looking forward to booking next year
1st 16- 5 - Rich Coles - p34
2nd 13-11 - Pete Neate - p19
3rd 10- 4 - Tony Rixon - p5
4th 9- 1 - Vic Bush - p37
5th 8-15 - John Fuidge - p39
6th 8- 3 - Lee Williams - p17
Overall
1st 97-11 - Vic Bush
2nd 92-13 - John Fuidge
3rd 89- 0 - Chris Fox
4th 82- 1 - Ken Rayner
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