Today’s match (the section winner’s final at Gold Valley, a match that you needed to qualify for by winning a section in 2017’s teams of four or the 2018 Rushmoor league) was one that I’d been looking forward to for quite a while, especially as it was supposed to have taken place quite a few weeks ago but was rearranged at the last minute due to the ‘Beast from the East’ and the heavy snow that came with it.
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| Cheer-up! |
Given the considerable amount of extra cash added to the prize fund by the management team at Gold Valley the queue for the draw featured quite a daunting array of venue experts, Guildford bait-Tech teammates and some of the best anglers the south of England has to offer in the form of Will Raison, Robbie Taylor, Mark Goddard and Paul ‘Tommy’ Hiller – nothing to worry about there then!
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| A peg with legs |
With the match spread across Middle and Bat Lakes I think it is fair to say that everyone was looking for a nice dolly peg on Bat – personally I was praying for a draw on either side of the sunken lily pads (1 and 12) or the peg that Luke Sheriff won last week’s match from (11). Regular readers of this blog will know that I haven’t drawn a good peg for at least five seasons so I really couldn’t believe my luck when I saw a nice shiny 11 in my hand!!!
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| All the gear ... |
For those of you not familiar with the venue, peg 11 is on the causeway between Bat Lake and Gold Lake – there is an island (just out of long pole range) slightly to the right, the entrance to the narrow channel formed by the island and the causeway to the right at an angle of 45 degrees, and there’s open water in directly front and to the left. For company I had Zak Brown in the corner opposite to my left, Paul Garrett directly in front, Charlie Dalton on one side of the lily pads and Gary Clifford on the next peg to my left (but out of sight) on the other peg next to the lilies.
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| The view to the right |
On plumbing-up there seemed to be a slightly raised area at TK+3 straight in front that was exactly the same depth as the majority of the swim at 13m – the areas either side of the shallower area at TK+3 were 3-4” deeper so I set-up two rigs (with identical components): pink Hydrolastic, 0.15 N-Gauge main line, a 4x14 Roob shotted with a 1” strung bulk of 7 number 9 stotz, 15cm of 0.10 Pure fluorocarbon to a size 18 Guru F1 Pellet hook.
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| Nice selection of vans on the far side |
I started the match at TK+3 straight in front, clump feeding micros and fishing with an expander on the hook. Even though the lake was fishing hard I was disappointed to have just two skimmers and one F1 in the net after 45 minutes. (I’d also been broken by an F1 that took me into some brambles to my right – after that mistake I made sure I played all of the other fish that I hooked to my left where it was snag free.)
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| A photo much like one above |
At 11:45 it was clear that it wasn’t going to happen short so it was time to venture out to 13m, initially on a line slightly to the right. This was good and got me a nice run of fish. When this line died I moved across to a new line at 13m straight in front (i.e. 3m to the left of the original) – this was a good move and led to another good run of fish.
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| Time to change the channel |
Going into the final hour the second 13m line started to fade so I started a new line at 45 degrees to the left in the open water (13m still) – I thought that this was going to be a really good option but it only threw-up the odd fish and was generally pretty slow. Luckily a switch to another new line at 45 degrees to the right into the mouth of the channel turned-out to be a brilliant move and led to another good run of F1s that saw me through to the end of the match.
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| Fomer MMT winner Zak Brown on the scales |
In the end my 55 fish (probably 50 F1s and 5 skimmers) went 51-8-0, a mere 2 pounds or so ahead of Gary Clifford (who included two big carp for 13lb in his total of 49-4-0), meaning I’d managed to win another big match and a whopping £770!!! (Zak Brown was third overall with 31-14-0 so Gary and myself were well clear of the chasing pack, that late run of fish from the mouth of the channel made all the difference and just about got me over the line.)
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| Cheers!!! |
