10/08/24 - Harescombe - Match Lake

Weight - 62lb 7oz

Catch - 22 Carp, 17 F1, 2 Roach

Weather - Mostly cloudy and breezy at times. Warm & sunny later.

Match - Summer Series rd 5 (14 fished) - 2nd in section, 2nd overall

Round 5 of the Summer League and a change of scenery when I finally drew the far bank in the shape p22. Allan Oram was pegged next to me on p24 subbing for Andy Jane who was 1pt behind me in 2^nd place and Steve Brown lying 3^rd was on the most consistent peg at the moment p16.

To consolidate my league position, I ideally needed to at least beat Allan. As usual for this league, my attack focused on 6mm meat covered in Uzit A-krill cloud, however I brought 2pts of caster just in case I needed to catch shallow, and I also mixed some paste (Uzit GLM).

I started short on meat and had 6 fish in an hour. Switching to the far bank I only had a small area to target of natural bank which offered shallower water, as most of the far bank was lined with wooden steaks. By toss potting meat with p-nut micros I caught a couple of better stamp carp in amongst the F1s and smaller carp.

As I only had the one small area to target across, I wanted to keep the swim going for as long as possible and switched to fishing paste to my right next to a reed bed as a back-up swim. Initially the paste only produced small F1s, but as the match progressed, I netted a couple of better carp.

Throughout the match it was nip and tuck between myself and Allan, and at one point I managed to get a 4 fish lead, but most of the time there was only ever 1 or 2 fish between us.

With an hour to go, both lines were starting to show signs of fading. I had considered trying shallow, however Mark Saunders on p20 had fished caster all match and only caught a handful of F1s, plus quite a few small roach, so I decided against it and kept nicking fish from both swims. I also caught a couple of F1s from my short meat line.

I had also been feeding meat and micros down my left margin, and to be honest the response was quite disappointing catching only a couple of small F1s.

As I still had the unused caster and I felt I needed another fish, a handful of caster and micros was deposited into my right margin where it was 12in deep. 10mins later the water was clouding up and the last 30mins proved to be quite productive catching 4 carp and 2 F1s on double caster.

Come the all-out, I thought (hoped) I had 2 fish more than Allan, which I did, however Steve took full advantage of his peg to win the section and the match.

1.    66-  7 – Steve Brown – p16

2.    62-  7 – Ken Rayner – p22

3.    59-  1 – Allan Oram – p24

4.    42-  6 – Les Harper – p29 

League Position

1.    8pts – Ken Rayner

2.    10pts – Andy Jane

3.    12pts – Steve Brown