Well it was the first day of the 2017 Milo festival at White Acres today – we are also fishing the Guru festival next week so come a week on Friday there could be some bargains on eBay if things don’t go to plan!!!
Things were buzzing pre-draw
Having been drawn into ‘E’ section it was Bolingey today with Pollawyn, Twin Oaks/Trelawney, Acorn/Jenny’s/Trewaters and Porth Reservoir to come. In terms of superstars we are in with Grant Albutt, Darren Cox, Richie Hull and Jamie Wilde to name just a few – at the end of the day part of the appeal of fishing these festivals is to fish against this calibre of angler so bring on the big dogs!!!
My first dip into the bag of dreams for the week put me on peg 17, a nice peg at the rear of the complex and as you’d have it next door to Bagger who’d pulled out peg 18 to my left. Pegs 15 to 18 all offer access to the rear of the central island so a tip rod with a free-running Hybrid feeder was the first thing set-up, as were pole rigs for the margin, the secret 3’ line and the bottom of the near shelf.
All the gear ...
My match started well with a nice fish first drop on the secret 3’ line followed by another first chuck on the feeder – unfortunately this was followed by two biteless hours during which time I had a right battering from Bagger (who was catching steadily on the feeder) and Vince Brown to my right who was catching on paste in the deeper water at 14.5m.
Damn margins!
At about twenty past two I got up off of my box and set-up a rig for fishing shallow at 14.5m and half an hour later I was back in the running as I’d managed to snare four proper carp on a tactic that I was told never works at Bolingey! Unfortunately this line quickly died so it was soon time for the margins, a line that I thought I really needed to work if I was to get decent points – with hindsight I became obsessed with the margins and despite seeing plenty of fish I only landed five between twenty past three and ten to five (one every 18 minutes). At ten to five I went back on the long pole shallow and got one straight away, leaving me wondering how things would’ve ended-up if I’d have stuck with this approach and ignored the margins altogether!!!
Andrew Crocker about to be 'ounced' by Bagger
In the end my twelve carp weighed a total of 94-8-0, only good enough for sixth in section (4 points) as I was beaten by Andrew Crocker (peg 10, 109-7-0), Bagger (peg 18, 109-10-0), Simon Gould (peg 23, 111-4-0), Vince Brown (peg 16, 123-11-0) and Vince Cross (peg 45, 140-4-0). So as ever things were close and just two or three extra fish would’ve made a huge difference to my score, that preoccupation with the margins really costing me on the day!!!
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