Sunday 29/09/2019 - Winmill Open - Match Lake

Weather forecast wasn't good for this match with rain on and off all day with the winds picking up second half. But glad I went as it's very rare to be as bad as predicted.

Arrived early to heavy rain so no walkies today. Brad introduced us to his new lethal weapon Mia (named after the character in Pulp Fiction - pictured right - Brads on the right) an American Bulldog. Brad wanted a guard dog to help dissuade poachers and thieves. Apparently Mia hates men a rescue dog abused by his previous male owner. Good luck to any Poachers hope you can run 100 metres in 5 seconds otherwise it's hospital time. It was suggested that he wear a muzzle during matches, however, Brad said he would have difficulty in talking!!

I don't like drawing the same pegs however, I wanted to draw peg 1 again only because I had some unfinished business. Last but one into the draw bag and out comes disc 24. Happy with this one as I would have shelter from the wind and rain and holds plenty of Silvers and Carp - if you can catch them. This peg is the deepest on the Lake at 10 foot. The usual plan to fish the first half of the match for Silvers and the second for Carp. As the wind wasn't too bad I set up the Ronnie rig set to 5 foot up the shelf and a 0.3 gram paste float to fish the margins. The RH side was cear of Sedges the LH however, was dense with them. So took the easy option going for the RH. I started by feeding the margin with micro then the Ronnie line with GB laced with LR's. With single LR on the hook started to catch small Skimmers to 4 oz until I hooked my first Carp which broke me. Re-fed and tried the paste - no indications. So back on the Ronnie rig and similarly after a few more Skimmers I hooked another Carp which eventually I landed. And that was the pattern catch a few Skimmers then a Carp. I did hook one Carp which initially I thought was a big Skimmer as it was coming up in the water only to see a flying 10 lb Mirror crash down on my rig - bye-bye to that one then. I kept trying the margin and started to worry I should have fished maggott instead of paste as I couldn't get any indications. The wind had now picked up making presentation difficult on the Ronnie rig so I made the decision to switch to the dangerous side on the Left with paste and started to catch some decent Carp. There was some foul hooking as the bites were really strange to determine today as to which ones were in the mouth and those not. I did lose one of the small Carp in the sedges complete with rig so changed from the Middy bungee blue to the Drennan 25 elastic, not for the faint hearted. I did lose some more Carp due to pulling too hard. I think on the whole I managed to spend equal time fishing for Carp and Silvers although not consecutively.

My Silvers weighed 12 lb 2 oz for second in the Silvers and my 18 Carp 96 lb for third in the match total of 108 lb 2 oz. Happy with this. They say there are no fish at this end - wrong we just can't catch them.

The match was won by Ryan Shipp (pictured right with the Silvers winner) with 225 lb 5 oz from unfancied peg 8. Ryan initially caught at 14.5 metres then came in close down his peg at 5 metres to catch some better Carp on 6 mm banded pellet over 6 mm feed. Great weight on the day and stopped Dave Willmott from winning the Golden peg.
The Silvers was won once again by match organiser Dave Haines with 14 lb 6 oz from peg 14. Dave fish caster and maggot over a small amount of GB and loose fed caster.
Result:

1. Ryan Shipp 225-05-0 peg 8
2. Dave Willmott 154-03-0 peg 16 Golden Peg
3. Mike Nicholls 108-02-0 peg 24

Silvers:

1. Dave Haines 14-06-0 peg 14
2. Mike Nicholls 12-02-0 peg 24

Weigh Sheet: