Thursday, 7 March 2013

Thursday 07/03/2013 - Veals/Bathampton AA - Silvers Championship - Bridge Pool


Plenty of good news emanating from Bitterwell Lake. Clive Reid (current fishery manager) has now opened up the Lake for “Matches - any day, any numbers”. Expect Rip of Rixon will be out there soon. He has also lifted all bait bans, so anything goes, he’s even selling pellets! The lease is up for renewal in May and I know at least one person that is keen to put a sealed bid in – unfortunately he can’t make tea. Then in June the fishery is to be closed for a few months whilst the council does well over due renovations, apparently spending £50,000 – there’s talk of 26 pegs – jury out on this one! The old changing rooms are to be removed and three disabled pegs put in instead. Move in the right direction - at last!
 
Before the draw proper the individual knock draw was held. I drew with Bob “Medium Sliced” Price. I offered to make him up some paste, but he already had some!
 
I decided for the first time against doing the Accidental Carp pool as I find it a distraction.
 
In the draw bag and out comes peg 6, Umm. This is in Section A, the same as last match. Also the peg the Gimp was on and struggled for a couple of pound. What made matters worse Dave Wride was on peg 9, the peg I won the section from. At least my pairs partner Chris Rolfe was in a different section – at last.
 
Arriving at the peg and a bit of luck, I found a 50p coin – a good start! It wasn’t the Gimps - he doesn’t carry money.
 
Sitting on my box I found I had the wind and rain right in the face. I decided to set up the usual two 4x16 jolly rigs, one for the maggot over GB at 1 o clock, where I had some tow in to the wind and one for the soft pellet over micro at 10 o clock where I had a lot more tow becasue there was no shelter form the opposite island. Both rigs were to be fished at 10 metres. Because there was an overhanging tree to my right (down wind) I decided to set up a 4x14 jolly for the CW&C.
 
On the “All in” I fed a few micros into the 1 o clock swim and some CW&C into the margin up to the tree. I left the GB line as I prefer not have too many swims open at one time, potentially splitting the fish. So starting on 3mm expander I didn’t have a bite for the first fifteen minutes, until I foul hooked a Carp – It was OK, it came off. So I re-fed through the toss pot and the swim came alive with small Ronnie’s. Any pellet falling through the water got attacked. It’s clear that the first pot of micro went to the bottom unnoticed. It was frustrating even for a Ronnie basher because I was missing so many bites and when I hooked them they came off. I even changed down to a 6 elastic with little to no benefit. It was time to feed the GB line and hope this drew the Ronnie’s away from the pellet line. After feeding a small ball of GB laced with Pinkies it was into the margin with a piece of worm hoping for a few Stripeys. First put in I had a decent fish which proved to be a 10oz Roach. Next put in the worm tuggers had arrived, landing four 1oz ballers. So I re-fed some more CW&C and tried the GB line. My plan had worked but in reverse the Skimmers came on to the GB, whilst the Ronnie’s stayed over the micro, which I stopped feeding. After a few small Skimmers I re-fed and tried the worm rig landing another 10oz Roach. I then hooked a big fish which I thought was a Carp and decided to pull for a break. Luckily I noticed a big flapper of a Tench tail and released some of the pressure landing a 3lb Tinca tinca.
I re-fed CW&C and back out on the GB line and low and behold another Tench on pinkie. A great start. The margin swim only produced a few more Ballers and after a run of six Skimmers over the GB I struggled for the last hour adding only a few Ronnie’s by fishing on the drop.
 
I was surprised to find that my weight went 18lb 2oz for another section win and a match second overall. I also got through the knockout, whilst partner Chris Rolfe stood up to the mark, gaining 3 points from difficult peg 13.
 
The match was won from in form peg 24 by John Smith (pictured right with the “Real” Pete Philips) with 24lb 4oz. John caught at 13 metres using either maggot or 3 mm expander fished over micro.
 
The accidental Carp was won by Pete Philips from end peg 4 with two for 18lb 8oz.
 
Full Result:
 
1.      John Smith 24-04-0 peg 24
2.      Mike Nicholls 18-02-0 peg 6
3.      Dave Wride 16-13-0 peg 9
4.      Paul Staite 12-12-0 peg 28
5.      Paul Barnfield 12-0-0 peg 26
6.      John Bradford 11-0-0 peg 11
 
Accidental Carp:
 
1.      Pete Philips 18-08-0 peg 4
2.      Harry Muir 13-13-0 peg 8
 
Weigh sheets follow:
 
 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

hallo mr nicholls just a wee email to let you no that it was i who was second in the carp side of things with 13 .lb 13 0z thank you very much ta be sure ta be sure.

Harry Muir.