23.01.14

Andy Bennett's Blog

Well, with a busy Christmas period approaching, I managed three Sunday wins on the trot in 50-plus peggers in December to take me to the top of the Matchman of the Year leaderboard. Once Christmas and New Year were out of the way though, I was raring to go again and had a brilliant start to the year, winning three matches on the trot, including round six of the Partridge Winter League, which I’m currently leading and would love to win individually.

The week started on peg 130 on Covey Five. I managed 80 fish for 62lb, narrowly beating Lee Addy with 59lb. Come the Thursday match, I drew my favourite peg 60 on Covey Three but with no recent form it was hit and miss as to what would happen. After a slow first two hours the wind pushed the fish down and I ended up having a brilliant winter day’s fishing, catching 77lb beating Paul Coyle into second. He’d actually had gone over on his net and was knocked back to 72lb from 76lb but he also had a fish of around 1lb in his net, so could have quite possibly beaten me on what was the bonus peg on the day too… oucchhh!!

Going into Saturday, I was full of confidence and hoping for a good draw in the Winter League to try and extend my lead in the Matchman of the Year. Peg one was my home for the day and I was pleased for the lake points, as it’s one of the top three pegs on that lake. However, the lake hadn’t been fishing great, so framing was going to be hard. I assembled the same rigs as the past two matches; a 4x10s slim pattern float, tied up on 0.13mm N-Gauge to 0.10mm bottom and a size-20 silver fish match hook. Shotting was tapered, strung-out number 11 shot. I also set the same float up for fishing in the deep water but in a four no14 version, as it was 7ft deep there. Shotting for this this was a simple bulk and two droppers, finished with the same line and hooks. All the fish were caught on maggots in various depths and at various distances. I managed to catch 39 fish in total; mainly F1s, with odd ide and carp for 53lb and my 3rd win on the trot, as the in-form lakes fished harder.

So a great start to the year, hopefully it may continue at least for another few weeks until the end of the season!

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