The older I get the more I forget I think, I am sure there are many things I mean to mention in my blog and later in the week I recall them. Another busy week where Wednesday I was in Birmingham presenting an award, the event was hosted by news reader Katie Dereham, nice lady.
For a change I went out Friday night with the wife and we had a nice meal and a few drinks and had a good chat with Shaun Townsend and his wife Lyn. Next day I woke I was a little tired, it was either the day 20km on the bike to work and back, the 6km walking to pubs and home, or the many pints of Thatchers.... perhaps all three took their toll.
Saturday popped to Scotts, saw a few anglers in there including Bob Price who told me still reads my blog and likes it, thanks Bob. I was at home all afternoon and had time to prepare some rigs and gbait etc whilst listening to the radio, and it was rather pleasant listening to the Gas winning 6-0 away from home.
Sunday morning all fit and ready to go and by far the best breakfast at the Crown so far I feel. Lovely people in here run the pub and I'm glad we had to move to this pub from the rugby club. Anyway, paid my pools, picked up a few Preston bits I had ordered and then got told draw was done and I was in the trees on peg 118. I'd rather not go to the trees when the river is low and clear but such is life.
The section is only 5 pegs, but it was well spread, Rich Whitmarsh was on 113, then myself, Towner was on 122, Shane Caswell 126 and finally a young lad called Randy Branston on peg 130 was end peg and the end peg is always a boon here. Before I go on I should mention that Shane has bought a new keepnet recently, and the last two matches he has had a lot of trouble with it tangling up as he weighs in, wish I had a video of it lol.
I got down in the water and got comfy, I set up a crowquill, feeder, and 4 pole rigs, a chopped worm rig, 1gm, 2gm and 3gm flat float. I was a minute or so late starting, so Shaun below me balled it in before me, then I got going and threw in 12 balls. Out with the 2gm rig and no bites on a caster or a maggot, out with the 1gm and finally a couple of roach on a maggot but right down the peg below the gbair, it was not a good start, but then I had a couple of fish over the gbait, including tow perch. I was struggling though and was concerned, so when I then saw around 10 to 12 bream roll up and down the far side within a couple of minutes I was just waiting for them to arrive on the pole line, they didn't.
After about 40 minutes and no more than 1 1/2lb in the net I had 10 chucks on the feeder to get more bait out there. I tried the crowquill over the pole and had a couple more roach but again these were down the peg. I tried the pole again and out of the blue had two roach that must have been nearly 8oz each, then I had a couple more perch and then it was dead. I gave the feeder a go but it was just a couple of little roach.
From this point on things went downhill for me big time, I just could not get any bites on the pole or crowquill. In fact I think I went two hours without a bite over my pole line, and just had a couple of perch a roach and a ruffe on the feeder. I was looking at a very bad result and hoping that one of those bream would grab my feeder hook bait. With about 35 mins to go, after a good go on the feeder I had another look on the pole, blow me the float went under, and it did so every run through until the end of the match, though bites were quite hard to hit with little flow and a terrible light which made it hard to see the float. When I called all out I was left feeling happy with the ending but not sure what else I could have done.
Everyone in the section was admitting to 5lb, so as I thought I had 5lb I wasn't thinking I would do to well, Randy had 7lb 6oz and won the section, Rich was 2nd with 7lb 3oz, Shaun had a late skimmer to give him 6lb 13oz, Shane had some nice roach for 6lb 10oz, and I was last with 6lb 6oz. Just 1lb between all five of us and I was whipped. Such is life, I didn't feel like I fished a bad match, it was just hard, I bumped and dropped a couple but we all do that. There you go, from Hero to zero lol.
I had heard during the match the river was fishing hard, and so it proved with Warren Bates only needing 13lb to win the match, he was on 76 and had a 5lb bream plus plenty of roach. 2nd was Paul Elms from form peg 92, Paul had a lot of chublets. Mark Harper was 3rd from peg 5 and Mat Challenger framed again with 9lb from peg 49. Just out of the frame was Andy Curry, fair play to him as he is just getting back into his fishing and it was good to see him again.
Bathampton won on the day and Nomads came 2nd, my lot were third, which means Bathampton lead overall after two matches by 1 point from Thatchers.
No let up for me at present, I'm off to Germany working for a few days, Commercial House next week back at Keynsham, hoping I get my mojo back.
No comments:
Post a Comment