Sunday 23/01/2011 - Chilton Trinity Open - Woodlands

I put my usual £30 worth of diesel in the car yesterday. I was able to stop the pump at 10p over, now the cash dial is going so fast that I can’t stop it before it’s over by 33p or more – what’s going on!!

With Bela off to Viaduct with his long time mate Shaun Putney I was looking forward to travelling with Tim Ford as I hate travelling alone, plus it was Tim’s first visit to Trinity – Woodlands. I was initially told it was a belated Christmas match, which was subsequently converted to an open. I think we all have had enough of Christmas.

The match was organised by Misha (pictured right) daughter of Sue and John the fishery owners. I must say we were all spoilt during the match today with free oxtail soup and roll followed at lunch time with sausage buns and in the afternoon Mince pies - yummy.

The Silver anglers were hoping to draw the far bank middle pegs where the Skimmers seem to live at present. John Bradford was the lucky angler to draw peg 10, but we needn’t have worried as the Skimmers decided not to feed – as the do from time to time – even the Ronnie’s were to have an off day. So the initial disappointment drawing peg 6 disappeared after the first hour after landing eight Ronnie’s on double dead red maggot fishing over my “reliable” Skimmer GB fed at 10 metres. So in the knowledge that Pete Sivell had won the Wednesday match from the peg with Carp I decided to change to the margin. So I set up a 4 x14 Jolly set to 4 foot deep to fish at 10 metres down the RH edge. This was a bit of a wrench because I had the bitterly cold wind off my back so had to endure it on the side of my face. Poor Tim Ford had it in his face all match. In the rush to get fishing again I broke won of my Cardinal rules and didn’t plumb around enough and after feeding some micro I found a huge 6 inch step in the swim hooking it twice and braking twp hook lengths. So the decision was whether to go longer or shorter so decided on 9 metres as the trees were bit too much of an obstacle further along. However this line still needed a bit of gardening. I started kinder potting in small amounts of micro and hemp seed fishing single corn over the top. I was soon in and out of a foul hooked Carp. At half time I had four 3lb Carp and had lost four foul hookers – one in the tail which I nearly landed. In the second half I netted another four Carp losing none. My Silvers’ weighed in at 9oz and the Carp 29lb dead. This was good enough for fifth overall, which was one out of the overall pools by 1oz, but providing a section, win by 1oz!!

I must say the Carp were in excellent condition with some of the Mirrors having beautiful golden scales.

The match was won by Tony "Leslie" Rixon (no ones sure whether his middle name was given by his Granddad Leslie Rixon or his Godfather Leslie Williams aka “Chub Head”). Tony (pictured right with the Silvers winner) weighed 61lb 10oz from peg 24 – see his blog for more details….

The Silvers was won by Dean Mallin with 7lb 3oz from peg 7. Deans weight was mainly made up by small Ronnie’s fishing at 4 metres with red maggot.

Full Result:

1. Tony Rixon 61-10-0 peg 24
2. Paul Elms 45-0-0 peg 14
3. Brain Chivers 26
4. Martin Lenaghan 29-10-0 peg 32
5. Mike Nicholls 29-09-0 peg 6
6. Timmy Lewis 29-08-0 peg 2

Top Silvers:

1. Dean Mallin 7-03-0 peg 7
2. Tich Williams 5-08-0 peg 11