An-ice Weekend!

Following quite a successful campaign in open and practice matches leading up to our Supercup tie at Lindholme, I must admit I was confident of success, both on an individual and a team level.

If there is one thing that this winter has taught me though is that nothing is certain, and our sport has a nasty habit of kicking you in the chops when you least expect it!

A dramatic change in the weather, seeing the temperatures plummet to minus nine, meant that a lot of the more positive methods we had perfected in practice would have to be toned down to suit conditions on the day. This didn’t bother us however as all it essentially meant was that we wouldn’t be feeding as much, our basic game plan remained unchanged.

We commenced the draw at 8:30, and we weren’t too bothered which envelope we pulled out, as all the three of the possible draws seemed pretty fair. Unfortunately the area of the lake in which I drew was quite badly affected by a thick layer of ice. Like everyone around me, I spent the first part of the day breaking the ice, which seemed to get thinner and easier to break the further you went up the lake! It was sods law that the two anglers I was fishing against for the section were on the pegs above me!

I managed to break a channel in the ice out to around ten metres, and kicked the match off here. I knew my luck was out after waiting around 20 minutes for my first indication, the wind got up and pushed the sheet of ice towards me, meaning I had to stop fishing and spend another 10 minutes ice breaking!

By this time, the chap two pegs above me had four fish, and the other angler in my section to my right had two fish. I was not a happy bunny!

To cut a long story short I ended up scratching about on five sparsely fed lines for three F1’s and two ide, to finish the match with a weight of 5-6-0. The chap to my right weighed 5-71/2, and the angler two pegs to my right comfortably won the section with just over 20lb. Obviously, I was gutted with this result, which left me last in section, but to put it in to some kind of context the angler to my left weighed in 10oz, which consisted of a chub he caught at five past three, while the angler two pegs to my left blanked! I could definitely have fished better, and should have finished second in section, but I can’t help but think I was just off where the fish were!

Missing out by just a little bit was unfortunately the tone of the day for the team as well as me as an individual. We recorded four section wins, two seconds and two thirds to finish with fourteen points, while Matlock had four wins, three second and one third to beat us by a point!

Its all to easy in situations like this to muse on the “What If’s”. If the Matlock lad to my right had not had that ten ounce chub, we would have won by a point, as he would have took a four for blanking instead of a two for finishing second in section. If I would have caught a two ounce roach we would have drawn on points and beaten them on weight, if another one of our anglers had not lost two F1’s at the net, we would also have beaten them on weight.

Such speculation is fruitless however, as at the end of the day it is only the result that matters. We were beaten fair and square by a stronger team on the day, who put in a very good performance. They are a great set of lads as well and I wish them all the best in subsequent rounds, I would put money on them reaching the final.

More Of The Same!

After such a disastorous Saturday, I hoped for a better day on Sunday in my clubs Winter League at Lakeside Fishery Ranskill. With membership standing at 37 anglers on matches predominantly fished on a 41 peg match lake there are normally a few bad pegs in however, and I just hoped to avoid drawing one of these!

Luckily, another icy evening where temperatures plummeted to minus nine, twinned with Sheffield United taking on the mighty Middlesborough at home, put a few of the regular stalwarts off, and with 13 anglers not showing we all had a little bit more room.

Venue owner Steve always breaks the ice with his jet ski for us before the match, but it was so cold that all the pieces he had broken reformed and refroze in the middle of the lake!

I drew peg 25, and was happy with the draw as it is a good silverfish peg. I fed three lines, a neat joker line at six metres, a groundbait and joker line at 12 metres, and a caster line at 14.5 metres, where I hoped to get amongst some better ide and skimmers late on in the match.

I started the match on my joker line and took a few small roach, before going onto my groundbait line at 12 O’clock. I managed to slot into a nice rhythm, and though I was having to wait for bites I was coming back with a small skimmer every put in. At twelve O’clock I had a dozen skimmers for around three pounds. Then disaster struck.

The sheet of ice that had reformed in the middle of the lake began to drift across the lake, at the head of a slight breeze. It bealined straight for us, and before long was sat in front of me and the peg to my right. I was unsure What to do at this point, as obviously I had feeding fish in my peg, so throwing an ice breaker in didn’t seem like a sensible option!

Dave Loveday, the bloke on the peg to my right was more imaginative however, and decided to use his pole to push the ice back out! This worked, but predictably it got so far across the lake before the wind got hold of it and bought it back, not before I had had chance to ship out and have another skimmer however!

When it came back, Dave tried to do the same thing again, but by now the ice was to thin to push and just kept breaking up, so he packed up and went home!

I could not really fish the peg properly until the last hour, when the wind changed and pushed the ice further down the lake. My peg was not as strong as it was earlier in the day, which is surprisingly a pattern that frequently repeats itself at Ranskill. Despite this, I took three more skimmers including a better sample of around a pound and an ide, to finish the match with half an ounce shy of 5lb.

That was enough to secure the section money, but with 8lb making the main frame I was gutted that ice moved in, as I would have confidently had double figures had it not done.

I suppose all I can do is hope that next weekend is ice free, as the stuff definitely seems to have something against me!