Saturday 3rd June 2006 – Woodland Lakes, Thirsk.

I rang up and booked my peg on Friday afternoon and was told that there were 69 names down and if they got more than 71 on, they would have to put in both Curlew and Wagtail along with the usual Partridge and Skylark. A quick call to Panic and transport was arranged. Purverted was booked on, so that was £2 in the pocket before I’d even started. I was also going to get my £2 of Shane, following my beating Purverted last week, I was quid’s in.

I arrived at Woodland’s after a brekkie at Moggie’s. Panic was telling me that he went on the Wednesday match, ordered an egg sarnie and a tea and was charge
£3-80; he refused to pay and starved all day – tight git.

On paying on, I reminded the young scroat behind the counter that he owed me £2, a quid dip in the till soon sorted that, making my pocket heavier in the process. Purverted had called Friday evening to blob off, he was sorting his truck for Monday’s deliveries.

At the draw, you get butterflies and a tingle as you put your hand in the bucket. If you draw the Slow Norris way, you also end up with pins and needles, whilst you tie your self in knots, cutting off the blood supply in the process. I pulled out Skylark 27, which was according to the local’s so, so.

I got to my peg to find that I had John McGarrell on peg 26, peg 28 was empty and Bill Brierley was on peg 29. Ian Bowman was on peg 24, Coyney was on peg 23, Pimmy on 21 and Mark Longhurst on peg 20, was I in good company or what?

I had already struck up a quid with Chappy at the draw, and he had drawn somewhere on Curlew and Panic had drawn peg 10 on Wagtail. I also got the nod to have a quid with McG.

I set up the following:

Rig at 6m was a 4 x 14 Drennan Carp 2 set up on Maver Genesis .16 line direct to a size 16 Colmic B501 barbless hook.

The 14m rig was a .3g Series E float set up on .16 Maver Genesis line, tied direct to a size 14 Colmic B501 hook.

Shallow rig was set up with the intention of fishing on the 14m line, up in the water after I had been flicking a few bits of meat out all the time. This was set 1ft deep.

Rig 4 was a 4 x 12 Drennan Carp 2 set up on .15 Preston Powerline, direct to a size 14 Colmic 501 hook. I plumbed up down the side about 2ft off the boards and found a flat spot about 2ft deep. This rig could also be used as an up in the water rig, to fish a little deeper if required.

I didn’t have time to set up a bomb rod.


McG had also set up rigs to fish the same lines and in addition he also had a bomb rod and a shallow waggler rod set up incorporating the new 5 – 8g pellet waggler’s. McG had on the smaller of the sizes.

The Menu

I had 1 small tin of corn, 3 tins of meat (200g) chopped into 4mm and 6mm pieces, 1 tin of hemp, 4 & 6mm expanders for the hook (1/2 pt) and 3mm expanders for feed (1 pt).

Off Putting

How un-sportsman like is this. With about 10 minutes to the start of the match, McG decided to strip down to his grollies. He sat down, and I am sure that I observed his ball bag hanging out of the side of his grollies, what a sight. I didn’t even know that you could buy thongs in XXXL. At one point, I mis-took McG for Peter Stringfellow (there would have been an uncanny resemblance if his hair was longer).

Underway

I missed the start of the match as I was still pissing myself at the sight of Stringfellow on the next peg.

After I had finally composed myself, I cupped in some hemp and meat at 14m, 6m and down the side. It was a bright sunny day, with hardly any wind and you could see the carp moving about just under the surface at about 15 – 20m +.

I went out to 6m, dropped in with meat, and waited and waited. After some 20 minutes, the float buried, and a tench of 1lb was soon in the net. It doesn’t take long to get them out on blue Preston 15h elastic. I dropped in again and caught a skimmer about 4oz, which came off as I was shipping back.

After a further 20 minutes, I went out to 14m with the full depth rig, expecting to get liners as I had been constantly feeding 3 – 6 pieces of meat at 14m. I dropped in with meat on the hook, waited all of 30 seconds, the float buried and a carp was soon on, then off again, foul hooked!!!

Third of the way in!

We were approximately 1 ½ hours into the match, McG had 6 carp, 1 tench and a skimmer. He had caught 1 carp at 6m, 2 at 14m, 1 on the shallow pole rig and 2 on the shallow waggler rig. I had 6 tench and 2 skimmers. One of the skimmers had come on the 1ft rig out at 14m. How can you fish a lake that is full of carp and 2 hours + into the match not have a carp? It’s a funny old game, innit.

After about 3 hours, I still hadn’t caught a carp and a change in tactics and feeding patterns were called for.

I stopped feeding the meat with the catapult, and started to cup in 3mm pellets and fish pieces of meat over the top. I did this on all lines, as I felt that (in my peg) the carp just did not want too much bait.

After about 10 minutes of this on the 6m line, I finally got my first carp, and for the next 30 minutes, I got 2 carp at 6m, 1 carp shallow (without feeding anything), and 2 carp at 14m at depth. McG had added no more in this period, so I was still 1 carp behind, but I did have more tench than him.

The Home Straight

With about 45 minutes of the match remaining my lines seemed to be devoid of fish. I decided to concentrate more on the swim down the side as I had seen some clouding of the water and a couple of swirls.

I baited up with pellet, put some pellets in the Toss Pot, dropped in down the side and waited. After about 3 minutes, the float dipped then shot under. I stuck!!! Nothing. I re-baited and did the same again. The float shot under and a tench that thought that it was a trout leaped out of the water, shedding the hook in the process.

I repeated the process and waited about 5 minutes. The float shot under and a carp about 4lb was soon in the landing net.

There was now about 15 minutes of the match remaining, McG had also gone down the side and soon had a fish on, and out. It was a carp about 6lb.

About Bloody Time

That was it. The match was over. No more. Stop now, everyone.

I had observed Billy throughout the match, he had caught on paste at 6m for the first hour or so, catching odd fish, then he went out on his deep rig at 13m and caught a few, then went out on his shallow rig, feeding very sporadically and caught a few more. He had fished a tidy match. But get this!!

He was on peg 29, I was on peg 27. That meant that I was some 15m away, he was also fishing at 16m, or near enough (for all you geometrist’s out there, how far is that as an obtuse triangle). I could see his bait from where I was, and it looked quite big. So at the end of the match, I went over to him to see what he had done, and he tried to tell me that he had caught on 6mm meat. From where I was, it looked (for all the world) that he had on a BIG pellet, probably bigger than the conkers that I use.

McG got up off his box, and he was a little red (Chappy has a camera video of McG watching the weigh in with his belly and tackle hanging out of his thong. It will be available by blue tooth on Saturday for anyone that wants it) to say the least. You know how sometimes, some of these porno stars have bikini marks, well McG had a thong mark, but where as these porno stars are tanned, McG was RED.

The corner pegs up from Bill had weighed in no more than 21lb. Bill weighed 60lb. I put all of my fish into 1 net (I knew that I hadn’t caught a lot, as usual) and dropped 26lb -8oz on the scales. McG put his fish on the scales and weighed in 32lb dead. The last gasp fish had saved him and cost me a quid. Chappy, was stood behind me as I weighed in and promptly held out his hand for his usual quid. He weighed in 37lb (ish). Panic was a DNW from Wagtail 10, but said that he had tipped back about 25lb. I never got my quid off him.

Pimmy won the match with 108lb, 33 carp. He caught half and half at full depth and shallow. Ian Bowman weighed in over 70lb, Coyney had just short of 70lb and Mark Longhurst had just over 70lb. There were 4 of them in a row that weighed in just over 315lb.

Hopefully, one of these days the draw will be kind, but in order for it to be kind, you have to keep going. It is the law of averages.