I frame in the wind on Yew

 Yew peg 17
A fair walk for me to peg 17 in this Fenland Rods match, with Roy (The Wizard) Whitwell in corner peg 16 to my right. And I was Golden Peg, though I doubted I would be picking much up after the match because 16 can be so good. The wind was really strong, into our faces a little from the left, and it was obvious that no-one would be fishing a long pole! And for a change I had a feeder and a bomb rod made up and ready to use, even though I prefer the pole if I can use one.

Within minutes of the start I saw Mike Rawson, a few pegs to my left, playing a fish on a rod, and a few minutes after that Martin Parker on 20 was into his first carp; not long after that his rod was bending again. After an hour fishing with a hybrid and a yellow wafter I'd not had a bite, but Roy had had two or three fish, and Martin had had some more.

Roy Whitwell lands his first fish, in the first hour. Look at how the reeds are
bending over in the high wind!

I change to bomb
I had a good look at Martin as he landed a fish, and reckoned that he was now just on a bomb, so I changed. Martin was casting right across to within inches of the far-bank reeds, so I did the same. And after 20 minutes, just as I was thinking about putting on a feeder again, the rod whipped round and I was playing my first carp, about 6 lb.

As I wandered up to John Smith, Dave Garner
landed this beauty on a waggler and mussel.

Next cast, and after 20 minutes, just as I was thinking of changing again, the rod went round again and my second carp was on; again, about 6 lb.  After the next fish (the bite for which came after 20 minutes) I wandered up to John Smith, who had two for 16 lb on a feeder; Martin now had six carp and a barbel. Roy had four carp, but I couldn't see how big they were because of the tall reeds between us.

The 20-minute syndrome

In the next two hours I landed four more carp, of which three took 20 minutes to make up their minds to take that lovely orange wafter. I also, stupidly, must have struck too hard at one fish which must have been a big one, and the hooklength broke.

Roy Whitwell snapped me at a good time - with a fish on 😀

               Now that's the best ending.             

All my bites gave a judder and then the tip sprang back. And in all cases I thought I had missed the fish, because it took a couple of winds of the rod before I felt it. I realised afterwards that it was because the bomb was very close to the reeds, so naturally the fish would move towards me. In that two hours Roy had more fish and on my left Allan Golightly cast a feeder to the middle and within about 30 seconds had a carp on. It was the only fish he caught.

Allan hit this fish within 30 seconds of casting out!

Safely in the net. The pole belongs to Kevin Lee, fishing the next peg.

A disaster
When bites stopped I followed Roy's example, and started fishing a pole, in the deep water only six feet from the bank, on corn. The elastic was 10-12, and I played my first fish for absolutely ages. Then I saw it on the surface, and it was huge - well into double figures. 

It seemed almost beaten, but I had to strip the elastic well back to try to get the fish to slide towards the net, because it was so heavy. Then suddenly everything went slack - the connector had pulled off. Normally I would have have netted the fish a lot earlier, so I can only assume that it was hooked somewhere around the outside of the mouth and the elastic had broken under too much strain. I might have said a naughty word.

I lose another!
I put out a stronger rig, with 18-20 elastic and cat meat and immediately hit a big fish, which came towards me fairly quickly but them suddenly shot towards Allan Golightly. The elastic stretched right out to him; the fish was probably foulhooked; then the hook pulled out.

I picked out aother rig and put it on a 14-16 Matrix Slik elastic and soon hooked another, about 8 lb, which I landed. Then with two minutes left I potted in hemp, which I am convinced was bringing fish to the swim, and a few grains of corn, and dropped in again. Very quickly I hooked another carp which I was playing when the match ended. That was hooked on the outside of the mouth, and it took me seven or eight minutes to land it.

Martin ended as winner...by two ounces.

The weigh in
As usual I was behind almost everyone else packing up - several tops and two rods. And I am always extra careful when I am moving around the peg, because as we get older our balance defintely deteriorates. So far the only time I've had problems is when a sudden gust of wind has caused me to overbalance and tread on a top two or other section; they can be replaced. I can't!

I caught up with the scales at Martin's peg, looked at the sheet, and was amazed at how low the weights were up to that point. Callum had 89 lb from end peg 30, but the rest were all below 30 lb. However I knew Martin had more than that, and sure enough he ended with 109 lb 15 oz, which would obviously beat me, so he had saved the Golden peg money.

Roy - 109 lb 13 oz for second place.

Allan Golightly's one fish went 6 lb, and then it was my turn to pull out my nets. My nine carp weighed in at 72 lb 13 oz, which put me third! But Roy's three nets also went well over 100 lb, and after a quick check Callum announced that Martin had beaten Roy...by two ounces!

Marks out of ten
I ended fourth, winning the end section by default, but was annoyed afterwards that I'd not brought out more tops and rigs so I had them ready to use quickly, if needed, because I had lost valuable minutes at the end when the fish were feeding. But when it's that windy and everything has to be done so deliberately to stop anything from blowing away, I tend to try to keep it simple. However I was pleased that I had changed from a hybrid feeder to a bomb and wafter, which I don't often use, and had a big selection of pellet colours available.

Then that fish lost on the light elastic didn't actually cost me the match, but it shouldn't have happened. The problem was that the fish was like a sack of potatoes, and I with the water there being over six feet deep I had to strip back so much of that light elastic that I put a massive strain on it. And the wind didn't help. The 14-16 I changed to was actually the best, I found. But each day differs.

All-round, when I look at the other weights, I was probably worth 6.5/10. But when I got home I immediately spent a long time putting several rigs on my short tops ready for Damson, which was my next match.

THE RESULT