Thursday 20th May 2010.
Unfortunately after last weeks match whilst packing up I managed to stand on my last Preston Durafloat 5 paste float. So i went online to check out what else is available. In the end I opted for Nick Gilbert's hand made pasters. A brief email to nick was met with a speedy response and i settled on the .6 gram ones that would suit the match lake depths. I placed the order on Monday and they arrived on wednesday, hows that for fantastic service? I must say that they were very well packaged, beautifully prepared and finished to an amazing standard and i couldn't wait to give them a try. So I set off nice and early and sat myself down on peg 5. The idea is that I am practising the methods and baits required on the pegs that i am pretty sure are going to be put in come the match. Peg 5 has an island at 13m and a good margin as well as about 5-6 feet of water down the track. I set up a dibber for fishing tight across with hair rigged pellet and a paste rig down the track. In a nutshell I struggled to get the fish going across, I had a few but there isn't any cover there now so the fish are a bit shy. I had to fish into the stick ups to get the carp. So I settled on the paste line and basically caught tench, skimmers and the odd carp all day long. Nicks floats were absolutely brilliant. They are very robust but at the same time nice and sensitive, he has got the balance spot on. They sat beautifully in the water and were very stable and the shotting capacity was spot on. I really dont know why i waited so long to switch over but I am glad I did!!
Come the match and I was primarily prepared for the paste, but as you do I pulled out peg 19, a method feeder peg cast tight an island with stick ups. The stick ups were knocking frantically with fish so it was a bit of a no brainer really, although i did have to cast almost in them to get bites and this caused a major problem. You see what I had failed to do was th have any spare animal hook lengths tied up and just previously i had run out of heavy hook length trace. You can guess what happened next as when I didn't have a fish on i pretty much got snagged on the stick ups and had to pull for a break. In the last hour I finally stripped down the rig and tied up a hook length using 8lb reel line. This did the job and i had the majority of my weight in the last hour, but the damage had already been done and i ran out of time. I weighed in 44lb for 3rd but in all honesty i should have at least doubled that as the peg was solid. I was unprepared and paid the price. The next day it was off to The Tackle Barn to stock up and I'm now trying out the Guru NGuage line MWG hooks and PR36's. This should sort them, Ill let you know how they perform. Whilst in the shop I got one of the 10' mini garbolino rocket pellet waggler rods and a 10' mini Shimano force master feeder rod for the short chucks. The are obviously both budget models but they seem fine and will be ideal for the short chucks. Lets hope I can give them a work out next week.
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