07.01.16

Steve Ringer reviews his year!

It’s been a while so I thought it was about time for an update and what better time to do so than the start of a new year! Looking back at 2015, overall, it was a pretty decent year for me, what with winning the Westwood Lakes festival, then coming 3rd in the Daiwa WalterLand Feeder Masters.

After that I was part of the England Feeder Team that retained gold in Holland before myself and my brother clinched the world pairs title in September despite me spending the final day in hospital! I have to admit the World Pairs was possibly my favourite win of the year as we had been runners-up the two previous years and it was a relief to finally get over the line. It was also nice to finish the year with back-to-back wins, firstly in the fiercely contested Tunnel Barn pairs with Adam Wakelin and then the Barston pairs, again with the same partner.

At Barston I was fortunate enough to find myself on the famous 124 peg. This is an end peg and offers loads of room to the right where no one else can fish. It isn’t a peg that always produces though and after 45 biteless minutes fishing in front of me I was starting to fear the worst. Eventually, by going long to my right with a small 36-gram Hybrid feeder, I found the F1s and went onto put a section winning 87lb on the scales.

On the subject of the Hybrid feeders I have to say that they have totally revolutionised my feeder fishing to such an extent that I can’t remember the last time I used anything else! What I love about them is that they protect the bait so well on the cast so there is no risk of the bait coming off of the feeder on impact. This is something which I believe can be a bigger problem than people realise when fishing the method. That said, of course the method feeder still very much has its day and when I really want to attack a swim there is still nothing better as you can get a lot more bait on a method in comparison to a Hybrid.

So moving forward this year the main target has to be gold in Serbia with the feeder team, I know we say this every year but this really will be our biggest test yet with the venue being so far away and one we know very little about. We will do our homework and fingers crossed, come June, all the hard work will pay off.

Other than that there is a new competition called the Feedermasters which I really fancy getting my teeth into. With so much of my time being taken up feeder fishing these days, this is a competition that I feel really suits me. As well as the Feedermasters I will also be back to Ireland hopefully for two weeks this year as it’s a place I love and the fishing being so attacking seems to suit me. There is something special about fishing big wild waters as you just never know what’s going to happen or what you are going to catch for that matter!

So that’s me for the time being, the next few weeks will see me visiting Tunnel Barn Farm on the winter league, which Team Guru are currently winning. We are only at the halfway point though so a long way to go yet! There is also the Boddington pairs that my brother runs as well as the Meadowlands teams of three which has just started. After a blank in the first round things can only get better for me as far as Meadowlands is concerned, though!

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