Saturday 20th Aug 2005 - Open Match
Trevor Price "Great day, Good result and didn't loose a pound to the winner!! " My plan hardly worked, Trev won the match with a fine 293lb and I struggled with the others on the car-park bank. So much for having a match plan. Trev has taken no time to get back in tune with Rolfslake as today's match win is testament. Trev struggled to start with as anglers in the deeper lake struggled for bites. I think it was close to 20mins before I saw anyone with a fish. I was not far behind and still fancied getting a few fish. I had a few fish blowing on my initial feed and had taken a 5lb fish on a hard pellet. I wanted to get the fish up in the water and started 'pinging' pellets from the off. A few fish seemed to be floating around and an early change resulted in a few fish, including a 6lb Orfe. However, as soon as I had caught a few the bites dried up and I was struggling again. Frank Wedgbrow sat on next peg (24) and followed my tact with a switch to up in the water with only a single fish. Both Frank and I wasted about an hour and our matches never got any better. Trev was sorting a few fish as his peg improved as the match went on. Catching at 6m on top of the shelf with soft paste and alternating 6mm Expander and 4mm Sinker was the key to keeping the fish interested. The GOT Baits boss told me after that he had to feed 2 to 1 in favor of the expander to get the best from his peg, but lost fish cost him a big 300lb weight! Unlike my woes, a HUGE fish was lost on the whistle that cost me my TON! as I went to net the beast the fish was coming in very slowly and without too much trouble, I knew I had one early chance to net the lump, as I stooped the air horn blasted and and the fish shot back into the middle of the lake trailing an ever tightening red-hydro behind it. The fish was lost some time later - just after my arm started to fall off and I pulled too hard to stop a run.
Elsewhere the lake had fished as bad as I can remember for an August match, which is a bad omen for the August festival next weekend. However, there was fish for anyone willing to sit it out for a bite. Andy Sellers took a good number of fish and kept us all guessing to the winner right up to the final whistle. Andy fished paste at 5m and tight to the trees but struggled with too many 'pricked' and foul hooked fish - about 20 lost fish in total! his final total of 208lb was a far ahead of 3rd as he was behind winner Trev (about 90lb). In third place was Clive Whitehead who had taken fish very late on Peg 21 for a few quid. My 79lb was good enough for 9th and my drive home was spent reflecting on how could I have doubled that weight. By the time I got to Bath I had concluded that I fished paste in too much water and a 10m line may have been better, to double my weight I would have needed to re-draw a better peg!
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