I have to say that I wasn't really looking forward to Round 1 of Malc Fowler's and Jeff Dickinson's Pairs League at Willinghurst. Not only have I hardly caught a fish there for weeks, the weather for the weekend was forecast to be freezing cold and my club also had a match on the ponds round the corner from my house that I'd much rather have been fishing !Nevertheless, I'd agreed that me and Don would fish the pairs and as you could choose your section, I let him choose Top and New Lake which left me with Pittance and Horseshoe.
Despite all the weather warnings, I awoke to find that we'd not even had any frost but it did start to snow as Don arrived to pick me up at 7.15am.
Having paid our pools Don then drew himself Top 19 and handed me Horseshoe 3, a peg in the furthest bay that I don't peg on my matches but one that can produce in the right circumstances. I was relieved to find that with the wind blowing from left to right, my peg was flat calm as New Lake is much higher than Horseshoe Lake and shelters part of it when the wind blows from that direction. I set up a couple of rigs to fish for silvers with worm and caster, a pellet rig complete with Hook in the Loop to fish for F1's and carp and a maggott feeder.
After a slow start I had a couple of small roach on caster but you couldn't catch enough to make it worth fishing for them as I knew you'd need a carp or two to finish in the top points.
I'd been flicking out a few pellets over my 14.5 metre F1 line and with my float a mere dimple on the surface and with it being a hook in the loop rig, I fancied catching a few F1's should they be about. Sure enough third put in on the long line with a 4mm expander the float dipped slightly and my first F1 (a fish of about 2lb) was soon in the net.
However, it all went horribly wrong from then on as the wind turned round completely and started blowing twice as hard from right to left. This not only meant that even if I could hold the pole at 14 metres, I couldn't actually see a bite as the waves made it impossible to see the float.
I did catch a few more roach on the shorter silvers line but with two hours to go and me only beating three anglers on the lake - one of whom being Lee the kick boxer (who'd actually packed up), I made the decision to sit it out on the maggot feeder in the hope of a proper carp.
Whilst Mick Farrington behind me on Peg 16 had caught 4 big carp on a maggot feeder casting to the end bank in his peg, all I could catch was tiny little roach although I hoped that by constantly casting in the same place (well close ish), I would attract a lump or two and they'd push the roach out of the peg and snaffle my double maggot hookbait.
The plan seemed to be failing miserably until the final cast of the match when I had a tiny little tap on the tip and lifted the rod expecting another tiny roach to be hanging on. However, as I lifted the rod I could feel something on the end which felt like a large whale or small submarine ! The unseen fish kited to my right towards Woody as the clutch gave it some line but by keeping the rod low and winding slowly I soon had it under my feet and after a bit of plodding about I soon saw the fish a couple of feet down and it was HUGE !
By this time the match had ended but with 15 minutes left to net the fish, I knew it was mine and sure enough, despite me being very very careful, as you do when it's such an important fish, I soon had it in the net, a great big mirror which I think was possibly 20lb+ !!!!!!!!
Now that's what I call a bonus fish ! or it would have been had I caught it but I just made that up to make the report sound more interesting ! My last cast did infact result in another half ounce roach boosting my total weight to 2-8-0.
Mick Farrington's 4 carp and a few roach gave him 43-4-0 and not only did he win the lake also won the Pairs event with Brian Green (no, we couldn't believe it either) with 19 points out of a possible 20. I felt gutted as Don won the Top Lake with 16lb (two carp) and with me only finishing 7th on my lake, we finished one out of the money in 5th place and I just felt I'd let him down.
I'm not sure about the overall placing's but my lake finished something like this:-
Peg 1 Ian Summers 0-7-0
Peg 2 Ben Emery 8-0-0
Peg 3 Dave Pearson 2-8-0
Peg 5 Alan Wood 0-10-0
Peg 7 Ian Covey 8-8-0
Peg 9 Terry Bolton 26-8-0
Peg 10 Reg The Edge 8-10-0
Peg 12 Mark Harrington 7-8-0
Peg 14 Lee Kendrick DNW
Peg 16 Mick Farrington 43-4-0
Oh yes, a BIG Thankyou to Mick Semour for lending me a fleece, Don had arrived 15 minutes early to pick me up and I'd rushed out and left mine hanging up in the hall - the one he lent me (a Deerhunter one) was so warm, I'm going to get myself one.
I don't feel like going fishing ever again but if I do, return here on Thursday to see if I can actually catch a carp again !
