Arriving early, nets dipped and a bit of a chat, more so a few were asking me what dross I was going to pull out today? I mentioned I have never been on a peg from 12 to 21. The replies were along the lines of 'well 19 is the worst peg on the venue', '17 isn't great but 19....well' or 'just go home'. Indeed once the draw got under way Matt Williams drew peg 40, which has been pants for a while now, paid his pools and set off homewards.
I drew and there were sighs of relief as peg 19 sat in my mitt. Lovely....Not.!! Anyways I stayed and made my way round to the peg, I had Rich Lovering on peg 17 and Lance Tucker on bridge peg 21 as my neighbours.
The water looked ok really, a few fish kicking around but there was some surface scum which was slowly drifting towards the bridge to my left. Pegs 24 round to 28 had plenty of the crap and the carp seemed to be plentiful down there.
3 rigs only as I couldn't be arsed to set up more. A shallow rig for banded pellet, this would do also for a foot off the far bank and for tight in to my near bank in around 12 inches of water at the most.
A rig for topkit left and right in the 10 and 1 o'clock directions (maggot, micro/expander areas) and lastly a rig for at the bottom of the near shelf just off the empty pallet of peg 20 where corn would be fed with a few pellets.
Bait was 6mm, 4mm and a few micros, a couple pints of live maggots and some corn. I also had a handful of expanders and some groundbait.
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| Peg 19 at Acorn |
The next hour only gave me a couple little f1s and roach. But we were all struggling, so I started to feed a few 4mm pellets at 2+2 in front in the remote hope that the carp may come there and shallow.
A couple more fish from across in 4 inches of water where I had seen plenty moving but were really uncatchable as most of them tended to be more out of the water than in. Not helped by the fact I went against my plan to feed via toss pot only and fed with a catty spreading bait and having too many fish all over the area. Numpty.
It was now the half way stage and to be fair I was doing well in my section, possibly only behind Brian on peg 22. Rich had a couple little carp, Gabe on the consistent peg 15 was struggling and it seemed the same down to my left.
I had started to get some fizzing shallow and some fish had started to come down my edges, so things were looking up. I dropped in the left edge and had a 3lber right away, then another from the right. I then went out in front shallow and missed a couple bites but picked up half a dozen fish to 8lb+ over the next hour and it was going well and I was happy. I even mugged 2 or 3 as they cruised out of the left margin.
Suddenly the wind changed and the scum on my side of the bridge (in peg 21, Lance's peg) started to drift to my right. My fizzing stopped and I never saw a fish down my edges, this all happened in 10 minutes, it was bizarre. Meanwhile Rich had one or 2 shallow but then got them taking paste and were a decent stamp. Gabe was flying along and was pushing on to 80lb. Lance also was getting one a bung on worms about a meter off the near bank.
The last 2hrs was pure boredom, while the guys around me were regularly getting fish, Gabe pushed on to my estimate of 100lb, Rich and Lance clawing my lead back and even those down on 24 and 26 were getting some fish. So from 1st or 2nd in section at the 4hr stage I was getting wound in and overtaken. I spent most of the last couple hours chasing shallow fish and fish in the super shallow water across, I managed 1 carp in this period and lost a couple foul hookers.
At the all out I felt like I had cocked thing up by not setting up a rig for banded pellet on the deck (I never had any paste) over the shallow line.
I said to Rich he was around 4lb ahead of me thanks to his last 90 minute spell of lumpier fish. Gabe would have 100lb and Lance not far off 70lb (he only had 10lb or so with 90 mins to go).
Further down I was sure they had all beaten me. Ho Hum.
I packed up and waited for the weigh in, had a chat with a few guys before the scales got to Gabe. He had 100lb 6oz, Rich had 61lb+, I had 57lb and Lance 67lb. Brian 80lb, Ken Rayner had loads of small carp for 40lb before Mark Thorne put 61lb+ on the scales (*weights may be slightly wrong as going by memory). This gave me 2nd last in section in a very tight section. But a few said my weight was good from the peg, so not a bad day I suppose.
The match was won with 150lb+ from peg 3, Barry Richards I think.
I know my lack of effort maybe cost me a few fish, would I have had 100lb to win the section if I had changed or tried something else? I don't think I would have, but perhaps 75/80lb may have been possibly. But that is hindsight, maybe I got lucky with that spell of edge/shallow fish?
Only 1 round to go, in July, can I draw a cracker? peg 1 hasn't been great....!!
Next up I am Viaduct for Mike Nicholl's 13m pole match on Campbell and then Sunday Landsend for round 2 of the Float only series.
Until then, take care and stay safe.
Lee
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