Commercial House Swineford, Crane Jack Whites & Frys

We all have days and times when we think this is not going well, time to give up and go home. Not just in fishing but I've seen it in many sports where people's head go down. However, time again those who keep going till the end might just get reward for their effort.....

I was eligible to fish the Viaduct Silvers Final Saturday, but with me working very long days at present I was really in no position to get my gear and bait together for that match, so I bowed out. Instead after some other activity that needed doing Saturday am, I then went to watch Rovers in the afternoon with the wife, daughter Lucy as well as Benz, Glenn and Podge. It was a poor game and we let in a soft goal and with 10 mins left it really didn't look like being our day. This group pf players though are used to coming back from a goal down, and in the last 8 minutes scored twice to win 2-1. Never give in attitude and superior fitness told, UTG.

Sunday morning and I was feeling OK even if a few Jamesons whiskeys still lingered in my head somewhere. I got to the rugby club about 5 mins before the draw, a couple of sausage and egg baps were quickly devoured as we discussed the pegging. I wanted to avoid the two sections up the crane, but Luck Liam Braddell did the team draw and put me back up in the long ash tip field in Pike Alley.

I walked up the river with Nathan Hawke who was going to be a couple of pegs above me, and Mike Kent who was end peg in the section, just above the bay in the Little Ashtip. It was a refreshing walk, at least it was dry after the early rain, just two bloody stiles to contend with. As I walked to my peg I found I had Andy Britt on the peg below me, and above me was Glenn. I went to have a walk down my peg to see if I would be in or off the water when my feet went from under me and I slipped all the way down the bank and into the river above my waders. I grabbed handfuls of stinging nettles and tried to keep my waist above water whilst shouting out to Glenn to help me. After about the 4th shout he realised and came to my aid and pulled me out, thanks very much mate I was stuck! Didn't look that bad but the top of the earth was wet and slippery and I should have known better.

Recovered from my fall I set about making the bank safe and getting my gear in place, my hands and arms were numb from the nettles, but it was just annoying rather than causing any problems. The river had a bit of flow but was still clear and also had a a few leaves on it, a sign of things to come over the next month for sure. I was opposite a blue boat and everything looked quite nice. That is except for the tree branches above me which were a pain all day and I hit them every time I swung a fish or struck on the rod and line, how I did not break anything is amazing.

With plenty of time to set up I gave myself plenty of options, a 1gm pencil rig, 2gm rig, 4gm, a 1gm rig for chopped worm, plus a crowquill, waggler and a feeder. This area is usually OK for roach and dace, but with a bit of colour in it there is a chance of bream and skimmers. I couldn't see any of the latter being caught here today. I was ready bang on time and on the all in I let fly with 12 balls of gbait at 13m which contained plenty of hemp and caster. Out with the 2g rig and bites straight away from 2oz roach and dace, but after 5 fish a pike took a definite better roach and bit me off. Picked up the pencil rig and this went under but the fish were a lot smaller, then I hit a better roach and the pike took that one. I put new hooks on both rigs and went out again in the 2g rig but it was much slower and I missed a few bites, so back to the pencil rig but it was tricky with odd bites from small dace and roach but I was missing a lot of bites. I tried the crowquill and this worked as I hit a few more fish until a pike snapped me up on this too.

In the second hour I mainly caught on the crowquill, but the wind was now getting up, and with the sun out it made seeing my float very hard. Then all of a sudden it was very quiet, I tried the 4g rig and held back looking for a bonus. I hooked what I think was a decent roach but I'll never know as the pike took that one too..... I was feeding hemp and caster over the pole line and thought things might get better as the day went on, but after a reasonable second hour the pole got very hard. I tried the worm line and had 4 perch here for about 12oz and that was all I had here. The waggler was a no no at this stage as there were too many leaves on the water. The light was really bad now and seeing any of my floats was a miracle, the wind was also blowing my loose feed all over the place. I was also having a lot of fish coming off the hook both on pole and crowquill, no idea why as it is not something I've suffered with for a while. To be honest I was not really enjoying my day at all, fishing in wet trousers, hitting branches, the bad light and pike doing my head in too!

I had spoken to Glenn and Andy and both of them had more than me, and both had not had pike trouble, jammy buggers lol! I took the odd fish by alternating pole and crowquill, but the peg was getting worse, and with 90 mins to go I took the decision to reball it. It didn't work for me initially but I could catch the odd small fish on the crowquill a few metres past the gbait. Until of course a pike turned up again. Darren Gillman walked along and he saw me pull out of a fish on the waggler, and I may have told him I was cheesed off lol. In the time he was gone I think I caught one little roach and he turned back up behind me with about 5 mins to go. I tried the pencil rig which I had on a 22 to 0.09 and bugger me if it didn't go under and I had a 3oz roach. Next tun through and I missed a bite, and then I hooked another bite which then went heavy, pike grrrr... Hang on though, not so sure, Darren and myself wondered if it might not be a pike. As the fish came in close I tried to get it off the bottom as I knew there were lots of snags in close, but with only 0.09 on it was tough. As the fish came up I just could not see what it was because of the damn light, but then it swam into my bank and I saw it was a chub. Before I could do anything it was under my bank and out of sight, I went to gran the landing net which then slipped into the river, FFS! I had no choice but to put my pole down and grab the net, as I got things together I just prayed the chub had not snagged me solid. I gingerly pushed the pole out from the bank a little further and saw the water move, and then the chub kindly swam out from the bank. I dropped the net in close to it and as I hoped it would it swam straight into it thinking it was a snag. Lucky last fish about 2lb right on the whistle, never give up right till the end!

When the scales came down from peg 1 I wasn't the only one to suffer with pike trouble, Luke Sorokin lost close to 30 hooks on peg 1. Glenn did well with his small fish and had 8lb 11oz, which was more than I thought I had. However, the last gasp chub swung the needle in my favour and I had 9lb 1 1/2oz, not really a good way to thank him for pulling me out of the drink! My weight got me 2nd in the section beaten off the next peg by Andy who had 10lb 5oz. Andy had no trees to hamper him and fished an 8m whip. Ivan Currie was once again in my section and kindly took a photo of my fish again.

The section fished quite fairly really with quite a few 6 and 7lb weights. Of course in the overall stakes the crane never made the frame...

1st Dean Harvey with 40lb of Bream from about peg 6 at Swineford on the feeder, well done Deano!

2nd Nick Coles with 18lb from the Beach at Swineford, he had 4 or 5 skimmers plus roach

3rd Graham Hunt with 17lb of roach and dace from the Steps at Jack Whites, that twice he's drawn this in two matches.

4th Tom Moretti 16lb including two 5lb bream on the pole from Frys.

Thatchers B won the day toed with Bathampton, but the B team lead the league now. Lucky Liam was next to the winner, but he blew out today. As I reflected on my day I was very frustrated and had not really enjoyed it that much. However, there is always someone worse of than you, and today there were a few... 1) Shaun Townsend, threw his net back in and had no landing let or keepnet, had to wait till 35 mins in the match for replacements. 2) Mike Davies, drew the deep peg at the crane and managed to snap two rods, 3) Rich Candy walked up the ccyle track but went a bit wrong, he got back after the money had been paid out, nice walk then lol!

Finally courtesy of Darren Gillman, a shot of Dean landing a bream. Weekend of next week see you soon.

ATWL Round 2 Bristol Avon Newbridge

Another very hectic week at work meant I was looking forward to the weekend. I had to wave goodbye to the wife Friday as she headed up to Manchester to spend the weekend with my eldest daughter Lucy. Ian Pauley did me a big favour by picking up my bait from Thatchers on Friday, I was feeling pretty ill again so was glad I could rest up. Had a few ciders Saturday afternoon with Glenn, Mike Nicholls and Geoff Francis, we had a good laugh and I wobbled home.

I woke Sunday morning feeling a tad dry, and a couple of pints of water were downed and helped immensely. Onto the rugby club for a nice breakfast and talk was of how hard the match would be with a a low clear river and bright sunshine forecast. Lucky Liam Braddell did the team draw for us, he came back with a decent draw I thought. I was on peg 24 which is a few below the block house and a peg which I've had before and has options depending on the river condition. It is a bit of a cow drink so you can get in the peg nice and easy and set up close to the water. I was the first peg in C section and I was happy with that as I thought the pegs below would be tricky. The river was very slow, and on this peg more of the flow is across the peg and there is a chance of chub. Ivan Currie had this peg a while back and had some chub, and I was confident of catching a few. I set up a 2 1/2 swan waggler with a 20 to 0.12, a maggot feeder with 17 B711 to 0.148 exceed for the chub. I only set up two pole rigs, a 1grm pencil float with 0.09 to 20 and a 1grm float with 13B711 to 0.16 for chopped worm. I didn't see the point of other rigs as the river was so slow I could hold back on the pencil float!

In the section above me on the next peg was Nigel Wyatt, and below me was his travelling partner Geoff Surman, two avid river anglers and top men. I began the match balling in with gbait, 12 balls went in today with just a little bit of hemp, caster, pinkie and worm as I didn't want to over feed the peg. I fed maggots to the far side with a catapult and kept that up all day. Out with the pencil float and with a single red maggot on the float buried as son as it settled, a 1oz roach was the culprit. Next drop in I had a bite I thought but hit nothing, but I was really struggling to see the float due to bad light. I did get another little roach, and then another was on but a pike grabbed it, I held tight and eventually the pike let go. A couple of small dace followed and then another pike grabbed a fish and bit me off. New hook length on and out again for a little perch and a dace and then a pike again. Another hook on and then a few more little fish before the 5th pike hit on the hour and this killed the pole line. Nigel Evans called me and spookily he had also been hit 5 times by pike, but he was still getting bites. My pole line was dead not a sign. I was thinking about the waggler / feeder across, but on the boat just below the tree a couple turned up and started up a generator and began working on it, great! A little later as the relaxed they started to get a little lovey dovey, which Darren Gillman spotted, but it came to nothing lol!

Time to try the waggler which I had set at 5ft deep, I had a 30 minute spell on it which yielded 2 bleak and a few missed bites from tiny bleak. I fed a chopped worm line down the peg on the pole and then tried the maggot feeder. I tried this for about an hour and had a few little knocks which resulted in a 2oz perch and a roach which a pike grabbed but let go of. Then I had a little rattle on the tip followed by a massive wrap round, got to be a chub, it felt like a very good fish but halfway back it came off, but as I wound the feeder in I saw I had a roach, well 3/4 of a roach, another bloody pike had struck! I thought I'd give the feeder one last chuck but had nothing, until I wound it back in and the poxy pike grabbed it, but I gave it some severe tooth ache as I pulled the feeder free! Ian Pauley was on peg 22 and he rang me to say he had taken 5lb of roach early but his peg had gone stone dead, as he put the phone down on me I had a pike take another fish and he told me after I heard you say "effing pike". However, in the top pegs in his section they were catching big roach, hybrids and skimmers,

The middle of my match was woeful, and the pole was dead, 1 tiny perch from the worm line, and a few bleak and a bonus 4oz chublet on the wag were all I managed. I thought I had 2lb in the net and was probably last in the section and I just didn't know what to do. With 90 mins to go I tried the pole with the pencil float again, I was now on a 22 to 0.09 (hook changed earlier after a few pike strikes) and had a couple of dips on the float but nothing was hooked, I took the maggot off and put a pinkie on....Bingo! The float went under properly and a 3/4oz roach was swung out, next drop in the same result, and the next and the next. Basically for the last 90 mins I had a small roach every cast, I even managed to get a few on the maggot and although the biggest was no more than 2oz I was flying and amazingly I had no pike! I did try the waggler quickly as I thought I might have fed the bleak off, but as soon as a bleak took the bait I gave it up and went back to the pole to carry on catching the little roach.

When the match ended I was left thinking what could I have caught if it hadn't been for the pike, I reckoned I had to have now 5 to 6lb but wasn't to sure as the fish were small. Only Warren Bates in my section was admitting to 4lb so it looked like I was going to do OK today. Ivan Currie and Derek Coles weighed me in and I was quite surprised when they called 7lb 6oz. Ivan took this picture for me.

As it turned out I did win the section comfortably as Warren was 2nd with 4lb 14oz. I think he may have said something to me as I told him I only had 4lb, well it was another wind up after my wind up about him on my blog last week lol! The section above me was much better and it saw some proper quality fish caught in a couple of pegs with first and second in the match coming from there.

1st Andrew Trudgian 26lb of skimmers, hybrids and roach to 1 1/2lb on the pole from peg 16. Well done and well deserved as Andrew has put a lot of effort in the last few years to get to grips with the river.
2nd Shaun Townsend 19lb of quality roach on the crowquill on peg 14. You can't put this bloke on fish as he will always do well, though he did get his ass cut by Andrew!

3rd Liam Braddell 15lb of mainly skimmers and bream from peg 107 on pole and feeder.

On the team front Bathampton won the day beating Thatchers by 1 point, so we are tied at the top after two matches.

I was pleased picking up £50 for winning the section and pleased that Liam bought the beers! It turned out that I was in the lowest weight section today, with I think all other sections being won with double figures of mainly roach. Glenn was on 78 and he had a perch of close to 3lb today, a bonus on the day. We really need to get some rain I feel to get the bigger fish to have a go, but you cannot complain getting plenty of bites from small roach, and other than the bloody pike the river goes from strength to strength. Did I mention Ian Pauley in my blog today, he did ask that I mention him as he said he is an avid reader of it. I had to mention Ian as he and Nigel both endured severe pike trouble, I thought I had it bad but they both went through 20 hooks, and Nige had pike swimming around his swim just under the surface. bad luck chaps!

ATWL Bristol Avon Swineford, Crane & Jack Whites

After catching nothing last weekend a torrid week at work was the last thing I needed, our new computer system was not working well in all areas and very long days ensued, by the last day of the month we'd not been able to invoice all our sales and I reckon £400K+ was stuck. I needed a a break and a good weekend. Got bait from Thatchers on Saturday, sorted a few bits and bobs out and then pegged out Jack Whites, and I wrote in Polish as well as English on the signs to say water closed. I was chuffed later that the Gas won away from home and a nice bottle of red to celebrate set me up and the first part of the weekend was good.

I woke up Sunday and the heating had kicked in, it was a proper autumn morning cold misty and the sun shining through, no matter how tired I feel on days like this I just feel alive. Had to take a picture later when on the bank.

This year we have 5 teams of 8, and that makes pegging fairly easy, with 15 at Swineford, 15 at the Crane and 10 at Jackies. Liam was drawing for our team and I hoped he'd do me a favour and keep me away from the Crane for a change. Fair play he did, and I was end peg at Swineford, one below the beach where Paul Purchase had taken 25lb on the Commercial House. Paul told me he had a lot of fish but caught 3 bream in the last 3 run throughs on the pole that day. I drove to Saltford and met up with Glenn Bailey and Shaun Townsend who were also in my section. We took the long, but flat walk along the cycle track and after getting across the bridge and kissing gate I had a few more hundred yards to go. Glenn was on the famous Bitton Brook, a peg known for chub normally, Shaun was on on the Beach peg and I was below him. Later we were also joined by Craig Fletcher below Glenn and then Mark Williams was below Craig. This is how my peg looked.

The river had a tinge of colour from the storms of yesterday, and with bream coming from here before I was going to make sure I gave myself a chance of catching one. I set up a gbait feeder first, then two pole rigs, a 2g with 20 to 0.10, and a 4g with 18 to 0.12. That was it today. The water in front of me was dead and I had to go 11m to find a bit of flow, and I opted to fish 13m. It was not straight forward as the flow goes slightly away from you and the river got slightly deeper the further you went down. For that reason I decided I would ball it and probably not loose feed but just top up with gbait. On the whistle I threw in 14 balls containing plenty of caster, hemp and a small amount of worm. Starting on the 2g rig with caster I had about 8 trots without a bite, onto a single maggot and started to get the odd small dace, fish which were at the most an ounce. After an hour I might have had 1 1/2lb of these little dace, I was certainly not bagging and when Glenn told me had had 5lb of dace I was already well behind. I topped up with the odd ball of gbit packed with hemp, caster and worm and the second hour produced a few more dace, plus a few roach and little perch but again the fish were small. After a few top ups the peg just went really hard and I chucked the feeder out for a bit, but the tip never moved.

Back on the pole and the rest had done no good, it was dead. It was now 2 hours to go and I was well down the section. Time for a gamble, and I reballed the peg and put plenty of caster and worm in the balls in the hope of some bream. Straight out over them with the pole looking for some early small fish,  but nothing no bites, I shouted to Shaun I've blown this big time! I tried the tip again and as before it was no good, so I decided to drop it in over the pole line. I had a couple of small raps indicating small fish, so I went out with the 2g rig and as soon as the float settled it went under, a 3/4 oz roach. For the the next hour I had a bite every chuck from small roach, dace and the odd better roach. It was my best catching spell of the match by far. It then started to go iffy, and I tried my 4g rig again fishing over depth with double red. I had a few small roach and perch on this, and then with 15 mins left I finally had a better fish on, turned out to be a hard fighting 2lb skimmer. With 5 mins left the float went under again and 1lb skimmer was my last fish of the match. Shame they turned up so late, but a nice way to end and I thought I had 12lb.

I had the board and we weighed from Glenn first, he had a busy day on the pole with just an ounce under 18lb which was 200 dace. Craig Fletcher had 2 nice chub on the waggler and with his bits had 14lb+, Mark 8lb and then Shaun next to me had 13lb 9oz. I was last of course to weigh, and was happy that my net went 13lb 10oz, although it would be fair to say that Shaun wasn't lol! Alas only 3 points from 5 and I needed the skimmers to show up earlier. Everyone in this section had a hell of a lot of fish, but they were very small. I guess after we get a bit colder weather this small fish will disappear, but it is fair to say that the river is full of small dace at present.

Another nice long walk back, by the end I was a ball of sweat and had drunk all my drink, I couldn't wait to get back to the rugby club and grab a cider, which Glenn kindly bought. Lots of small fish had come out and very few better fish it transpired, there were plenty of good weights though.

1st Graham Hunt with 18lb 14oz, dace on the whip from the steps at Jackies
2nd Glenn Bailey 17lb 15oz, dace on the pole.
3rd Liam Braddell 16lb+ dace on the whip below Graham (Liam is still drawing his wotsits off)
4th Andy Ottaway 16lb 4oz dace and some roach on the pole peg 18 Swineford.
5th Warren Bates 16lb 1oz next peg to Andy on 17 (with no one on 15 as he told Mike Withey he was on 14 the wrong peg to fish on!)

Thatchers won the day, with Bathampton second. Swineford and Jackies fished well again, but the Crane was a bit of a struggle again it seems. Oh and pike were a problem for a lot of anglers today, I had 3 fish grabbed but got them all out.

Foot note, Shane Caswell is having a very consistent time on the winter leagues, and he has been last in section in three matches now, I'm sure his luck will change as he can catch fish if they're in front of him.

Commercial House Round 2 - King Sedgemoor Drain

A new venue for the commercial house league in the shape of the KSD, mainly to keep some of the carrot crunchers in Somerset happy, Seriously it is a long journey up to Bristol so this was a nice way to give them a match on their turf. It was a busy week for me as usual, after a week away in Frankfurt I took a long weekend off and spent some time with my good lady, including Monday which was my birthday. I had a window of opportunity to make some rigs for the KSD only a few hours the day before the match, but I needed to know what rigs as I have not fished the venue since I was 16. I made a call to Nick Collins and he divulged some good info (and it seems he was asked by many others too!) and I felt I had a plan. I also had some info from Glenn who had taken 20lb from the venue practising.

Thursday I went down with a sore throat and it got worse and a nasty cough made me feel rough Sunday. At the draw we all knew that you needed to draw F section to do any good and as a team drawing an end peg would probably guarantee success. I had Liam Braddell in the knockout and I already knew he would get F section, and yes he did! Being in the same team I could not join him there and I was in B section and not the best of areas I was told, out of the knockout this year then.

I followed Paul Purchase to get to the right place to park up for my section, walking past peg C9 where Lee Trivett for Thatchers B was pegged I could see fish topping, as I walked won to my peg B3 I never saw another fish top. I spoke to Tony Goodland and also called Nick again to get more gen, nothing great and end peg should piss it.

My peg, my view.

On peg B4 Neil Mercer was already setting up, and he asked what was my target weight, I said at a guess 6lb and he said that was what he was thinking too. Setting up was simple, a 4m whip with 0.8g float with a 20 B611 to 0.08, a 1g pencil float for fishing past this as the "fish" moved out. A 0.4gm rig with 0.16 to 15 B711 for worm, and a waggler for fishing further across. All sounds nice and easy.....

Just before the match began the wind which was in our face began to strengthen and loose feeding a waggler line was no longer an option as I'd be lucky to get the bait to 11m. Starting on the whip I threw in small balls of gbait to line up the shoals of roach and hybrids, after 10 mins and no bites I wasn't that worried thinking they might be a little further out. After 20 mins it was like a tennis match with everyone looking up and down at each other asking if anyone had caught....no! The wind was now blowing my rig back towards me and no roach was going to have that, but luckily for me a micro perch did. Merc then had a gudgeon and an odd tiny was caught. I had a perch of 1oz on the whip and after another 10 mins decided I had to go long. I fed 2 balls of gbait with a little hemp and pinkie at 10m.  Tried my chopped worm line which failed, tried the whip again, which failed. Out to 10m and after a long wait a tiny hybrid took the single fluro, and then next chuck a 2oz roach was a real bonus. I never had another bite on this line, or the whip line.

The wind got worse and by mid match the lad on my left snapped his whip butt section, and Merc snapped his waggler rod! Why are shit days always made even worse!

The next 3 hours were biteless for me, even Rich Whitmarsh on the end peg was struggling for a few ounces, and there were a couple of blanks including Shane Caswell who always draws complete shite. Paul Elmes (he of carp slayer supreme status) had 1 ruffe and after a little walk was still smiling and probably wishing he was on a commercial. I managed to snare a motherless minnow and another micro perch in the last hour, and in the end everyone caught a fish in the section. I tried fishing a waggler down the middle feeding balls of gbait and never had a bite, I tried little bits of worm over little bits of chopped worm and never had a bite, it was total and utter shite!

When the whistle went we were all glad, at least in our section. Luke Sorokin won the section on the last peg with 6 1/2 ounces, yes 6.5 ounces!!!!!  Rich Whitmarsh and myself tied for 2nd in the 9 pegs with 5 1/2 ounces.  Need I say more.... Well in total the 9 anglers in my section weighed 1lb 11oz....

F section was solid, with Liam only beating one person in his 5 peg A division with 16lb, really!!! Paul Purchase had 27lb, Kev Dicks 20lb, James Carty 17lb  and Rich Lacey 12lb completed the top 5 overall in this one section. Nice fishing if you can get it.

Turned out I was top points scorer in our team which came last on the day, lol. The B team pissed it off the end peg 9, and Nomads won their div off peg 1. Not a good venue for a team match, at least not one with the same peg number in each section.  Still great fishing if you land on them.

Not much more to say about the day, a really unusual poor days fishing, but we managed to laugh about it as we fished and weighed in. The locals just could not believe it, and one lad in my section who had 1oz said it was the worst day he had in 40 years on the river, I blame Shane Caswell lol!!!!

Commercial house Round 1 Swineford, to Frys

Busy, busy, busy at the moment, spent a few days working in Munich this week, then took my eldest daughter to Manchester where she's got a work placement for a year. Whilst in Munich I remembered I had not ordered any bait, so messaged Andy Ottaway if he wouldn't mind sorting it for me, which he did. Thankfully Liam Braddell picked my bait up on Saturday as I was not back home till 5pm Sat night, just time to sort pole top sets and mix some groundbait.

Morning of the match and got to the draw early enough to have a breakfast, my bait was dropped off but minus any worms, so I had to buy some from Kev Dicks. It was nice to see the regular faces, ones I only tend to see at the winter leagues, such as Shane Caswell, Mike Kent, Kev Boltz etc. Soon the draw was underway and Liam came back with our set of pegs, as ever I wanted to be at Swineford, as ever I was up the bloody Crane again! Liam drew himself the best peg on about 15 at Swineford.

As I just got to my parking spot by the Marina I had a call from Andy Ottaway to tell me I had left all my bait in the Rugby club..... what a twat! Anyway he brought it for me as he was pegged next to me as it turned out. Turned out Ian Pauley also forgot his bait and Andy had that as well! Not the best of starts to the day and I was still feeling rushed like the rest of the week. Then when Andy was fixing his gear on his trolley a bungee slipped off and hit him in the face. Thankfully he caught him just below his bottom lip, bad enough and it was bleeding and very sore, but at least not his eye. Luckily the start was 10:45 so plenty of time to spare. Walked up the river with Andy and I was on the last peg in the little ashtip field, whilst Andy was on the first peg in the long ashtip, one of my favourites.

I set up a 2g pole rig with 0.10 to 20 B611, and a 4g rig with 0.117 to 16 B611, these were to be used at 13m. A 1g rig for chopped worm with 0.15 to 13 B711 was also put up. A 3 1/2 shallow wagg with 18 B611 to 0.12, also a feeder rod was put up. I've had this peg before, it can be very good but the bottom is awful with it shallowing up by 2 feet over about 6m, so I would ball it away from the shallowest bit.

On the whistle I balled in 12 balls Sonubaits, River, Lake and black containing hemp and caster. I picked up the 2g rig and started with a single caster, I didn't have to wait to long before a 2oz roach was swung in. In the first half hour I had a few roach and dace but had a pike take a fish then it switched right off for 15 mins. I was about to think about feeding the worm line when I had another run of roach on the pole, but again it slowed right down. I then let the float go to far down the peg and on the shallow part snagged up and lost the hook. Time to feed the worm line at 10m and angled down the peg. I was feeding maggots now and then for the waggler line but seeing bits taking them I wasn't keen on trying it. Andy was struggling like me, but Shaun Townsend on peg 1 in our section had 7lb after 2 hours having had a bream and decent perch on the float.

The wind was picking up and as it was downstream and into me it tried to push the pole float through, I decided to give the 4g rig a go although I really wasn't sure it would work. I fished this rig over depth and either eased it through or tried to hold it still. I tried double caster but had not bites, so on went double red maggot and I had a couple of 1oz perch and tiny roach hmmm. Then, just before the shallow snag, the float went down the hole proper and I had a bit of elastic come out of the pole. Turned out it was a 12oz skimmer which really perked me up,  and perhaps more would follow. Sadly it was a one off and the swim switched off again.

Time to try the worm line with a dendra, the float settled and twitched but the bite didn't develop, so I lifted the rig out and laid it in again, soon after it twitched and went under, 1,2,3 strike. A fair bit of hollo 10 elastic came out so it was a decent perch, it stayed on the hook and was not far short of 1lb. Dropped in again and nothing.

A few roach on the pole and then nothing again, they wouldn't settle. With 2 hours to go I picked up the waggler, why I didn't do this earlier I do not know (well I do really, I thought I needed decent fish to do well) as there were clearly plenty of fish there on the surface. I could get a bite a chuck, probably hit one in three bites, from bleak and dace and I kept myself busy for an hour. A few boats and canoes then gave me cause to try for a perch again, and I had an 8oz fish, but again that was it. I also tried the pole and a run of little roach, and as soon as though died I went back to the wagg. There were still plenty of fish there, but it was very hard to a) see the float as the light was awful, b) keep a tight line in the bad wind. With 15 mins to go the line caught some foliage in close and after a tug of war I ended up with a trashed rig. No time to set up again so I tried the pole lines and had sod all. I had a feeling that might cost me.

Andy was admitting to 10lb, I said I had 9lb, below me Bath stalwart and all round nice guy Chris Ollis had struggled for about 4 to 5lb he said. Shaun had not caught so well for the rest of the match but with his couple of bonus fish plus 7lb of bits he had a high 12lb to win the section, 2nd was Andy with 10lb 10oz and I was 3rd with exactly 10lb. The last 15 mins on the wag might have been worth 10oz, but we will never know. However, I think my peg was worth 15lb of dace and bleak on the wag, so I messed up trying to catch roach and skimmers, hey ho.

I did not go back to the results as it was the in laws 50th wedding anniversary party and I was the only relation missing! I went straight there from the match and soon most people had left, did I smell? lol!

I found out that the match was won by river legend Darren Gillman from the outfall at Swineford with 29lb of dace and bleak on a whip. Darren had a dream last night that he drew that peg and so it seems he's now mystic meg! Second was Liam Braddell with 28lb, he had 22lb of dace and roach on a whip and 2 bream on the stick float. Think there was another three 20lb weights and plenty of doubles at most places. Frys and Crane were the hardest places as I expected.

Right I need some sleep tonight as I'm off the Frankfurt working for the whole week, no fishing next weekend as I think I need a rest and will sort a bit more gear out.