After last Sundays struggle on lake 1 I was looking forward to going back on lake 2, except that lake 2 had a club booking so the open was on lake 1 again! Still, at least peg 27 wasn't in, so all I needed to do was avoid the other pegs in the 20's and I'd have been a happy man at the draw. I was somewhat miffed then when my hand came out of the bag with peg 25 in it, as not only did it DNW last week, but the angler on it actually blanked!
Having walked around the lake before the draw there was very little sign of movement anywhere on the lake, with the early morning rain seeming to have put everything down. I had won of the peg the two previous times I'd drawn it so while it had no recent form, fish do have fins and swim! First job up was finding a suitable area to target across. After a fair bit of plumbing around to find an area clear of roots I eventually had a small area, perhaps two feet wide tight to the island to target, where the slope was nicely manageable, at 16m and just to my right. Depth here was about 2ft. Simple rig set up was a small NG Floats XTM on .15 line direct to an 18 Fox Series 2 hook. Lakky was Preston 15h. Second rig up was for the 2+2 line. Depth was just over 6ft here, but I wasn't that optimistic on it going as I never seem to catch on it in the 20's! Last up was a margin. I had to do a bit of bank side trimming to allow me to drag the rig in to the only area I could find suitable- a tiny area about the size of a shoe box at a distance of my top-kit plus the short no 4 to my left. Rig for here was the standard .18 line to a 16 Fox Series 2 hook, with purple Hydro. I'm sure regular readers will know the form by now with regards to rigs!
On the whistle I fed across with just a dozen or so pellets, while the two closer lines both had about a third of a pot (hemp, meat and corn) I was being a little more cautious after the slow form of the area and one or two colder nights. Starting across on a 6mm expander and it took ten minutes for before any movement appeared, slight dinks almost certainly from small fish. I started to trickle a few pellets in via a small pot after, and this produced a liner which was followed up by a roach of about 1oz. The next couple of drops gave more knocks so I tried a grain of corn over. This done the job of avoiding the roach and after a short while gave me my first carp of the day, a small common of about a pound and a half. Topping up with a few pellets each drop the next two put-ins also gave me carp, both around the two and a half pound mark. Bites weren't coming fast by any means, at around a seven or eight minute wait, but I was pleased to be off the mark!
Predictably, after that flurry bites faded away so I topped up with about twenty pellets and had a look on the 2+2 line. First drop in on a single cube of meat gave me a dumpy perch so I sat on corn for a few minutes, but with no joy. Going back across on corn gave no joy, just liners so I went back on pellet. Three fish in three drops (all about 3lb) followed the pattern of the last spell on this line to a tee; bite and fish, drop in and re-feed, wait a couple of minutes and repeat! It also went off again after the third fish! I topped up again with the bigger pot and tried both the other lines, but again no joy followed here.
Going back across and the next spell of the match followed the pattern again, where I'd catch two or three fish before they would back off. Topping up and waiting (on another line) they always came back. The fish all looked to be averaging 3lb, with an odd one a touch bigger and with just over two hours left I found myself on twelve carp. The most frustrating thing was not having a productive second line to dip in on while resting the far bank. I wasn't feeding a lot across so followed that on the other two lines; small amounts regular, but with nothing to lose I dumped a whole pot in the edge. After a wasted five minutes on the 2+2 line I dropped in the edge on double corn and soon found myself playing something a bit bigger. A common of about 7lb graced the net but (unsurprisingly, as I hooked it so close to myself) no more bites followed, so I gave the line half a pot and went back across.
Resting the far line had done the job and with fifteen carp in the net with ninety minutes to go I put another net in (fishery rules, max fifteen carp in a net) and found myself thinking about getting the lake 1 match record back! The far bank line was seeming to fade a bit and for the last spell of the match I found myself catching in ones or two's before it needed resting. I was at least managing to nab odd fish from the margins now, but only ever one before needing to rest that too. Meat seemed to get a quicker response here, and the fish were bigger there aswell, averaging 5lb. A steady run of rotating lines saw me finish the match on twenty four carp, missing a bite on the last drop in across and wasting the chance for twenty five fish (I did lose one fish, so I could have done it!)
I was guessing I'd have in the region of 80-85lb (with the match record being 84-10 I think) so I had a funny feeling that the lost fish would stop me breaking it. Despite my steady day I was surprised to find that the form pegs of the last few weeks had struggled, and 20-25lb weights seemed to be the norm. After weighing my two "plips" for 3oz I lifted my second carp net out and was surprised when the scales went to 47lb. With six more fish (albeit smaller) in the other net it I began to wonder what I might have. With definitely more weight in that net two weighs were done and with the first one going just over 30lb it looked like I'd not only do the record, but may also do the the first ton weight too. Looking at what I had left mind, it was going to be close. I wasn't going to look at the scales but couldn't help peeking, seeing a figure of 27lb something and meaning that I'd done it, not only breaking the record but also doing the first ton on the lake, and my first in a few years too! I can't remember the ounces but a total of 104lb something was WAY beyond what I thought I would ever have had off the peg!
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