Well 22nd of April saw me down at Viaduct on the monthly Army Angling Federation Group 2 match.
After making my way down there with Si taking about a hour plus the stop off at the golden arches we turned up.
After having a chat with fellow anglers it soon turned to draw time with one off our members missing we were never going to take the teams by storm this month so it was damage limitation.
Well the hand went in and out came peg 123 cambell lake (what a draw i thought known as a tench peg and it was in the corner ) couldn't have drawn better just hope the tench were there.
After getting to my peg and having a good look round i decided on the plan of attack ,1st line would be down the left 13m fishing into the corner for tench i would have a 13m line straight out and a 6m line off to the 2 o'clock position.
The pellet wag rod came out as did the bomb rod as the bottom end of the lake was empty and i would try there.
Rigs i was using was as follows 13m down the edge would be a 0.2 MW power slim with 0.14mm super g line line with a maver mt4 size 16 hook 10-12 elastic. For the 13m line to my front i would use MW power diamond 0.4 with 0.16mm line same as before super g line with a size 16 mt4 hook hair rigged pellet 14-16 elastic. The last line the paste line would be Hillbilly paste float with 0.18mm line straight threw with a drennan size 10 nu hook elastic of choice would be purple hydro.
All in was called and of i went feeding all three pole lines with pellet,corn and caster down the edge.
With entering the silver pools as well i decided to start with the silvers first catch a good bag then go for the carp so 13m down the edge i went first put in first tench this went on for a hour with every put in pulling out small tench then it went dead for 10-15 mins before the float buried and the elastic shot out carp number one hooked it didn't take long to have it in my net using a pulla bung. having gone back down the edge again it was dead maybe the tench had moved out due to the carp coming in so i decided to rest that line.
With fish topping down the end of the lake i deiced it was time for the pellet wag this is some thing i stuck with for about a hour and a half with no fish going for the bait after adjusting the hook length and trying different things i reeled in and put it down and wasn't going to touch it for the rest of the match. So out came the bomb rod same thing happened had the liners but no fish.
By now there was only two hours left and the only line i hadn't tried was the 13m to front of me so i i went shipped out and flicked a few 8mm pellets over the top thumb float gone fish on and elastic ripping out got the fish under control and got it toward the keep nets as soon as it saw the keep nets off it went again this time i got it in and carp no 2 in the net happy days. Straight back out again saw the float thunder under again carp no 3 in the in the net after a good scrap. looking at my 13m line in front it was now buzzing with fish (got the feeling of bag up times here at last!) out again fish on this time it ran for it after 5 mins back came the float at a great rate on knots with no fish. Ok of back out this time I managed to get it to the keep nets got its head up and could clearly see it was caught in the lip as soon as it saw the keep nets of it went this time it snapped me.
After making my way down there with Si taking about a hour plus the stop off at the golden arches we turned up.
After having a chat with fellow anglers it soon turned to draw time with one off our members missing we were never going to take the teams by storm this month so it was damage limitation.
Well the hand went in and out came peg 123 cambell lake (what a draw i thought known as a tench peg and it was in the corner ) couldn't have drawn better just hope the tench were there.
After getting to my peg and having a good look round i decided on the plan of attack ,1st line would be down the left 13m fishing into the corner for tench i would have a 13m line straight out and a 6m line off to the 2 o'clock position.
The pellet wag rod came out as did the bomb rod as the bottom end of the lake was empty and i would try there.
Rigs i was using was as follows 13m down the edge would be a 0.2 MW power slim with 0.14mm super g line line with a maver mt4 size 16 hook 10-12 elastic. For the 13m line to my front i would use MW power diamond 0.4 with 0.16mm line same as before super g line with a size 16 mt4 hook hair rigged pellet 14-16 elastic. The last line the paste line would be Hillbilly paste float with 0.18mm line straight threw with a drennan size 10 nu hook elastic of choice would be purple hydro.
All in was called and of i went feeding all three pole lines with pellet,corn and caster down the edge.
With entering the silver pools as well i decided to start with the silvers first catch a good bag then go for the carp so 13m down the edge i went first put in first tench this went on for a hour with every put in pulling out small tench then it went dead for 10-15 mins before the float buried and the elastic shot out carp number one hooked it didn't take long to have it in my net using a pulla bung. having gone back down the edge again it was dead maybe the tench had moved out due to the carp coming in so i decided to rest that line.
With fish topping down the end of the lake i deiced it was time for the pellet wag this is some thing i stuck with for about a hour and a half with no fish going for the bait after adjusting the hook length and trying different things i reeled in and put it down and wasn't going to touch it for the rest of the match. So out came the bomb rod same thing happened had the liners but no fish.
By now there was only two hours left and the only line i hadn't tried was the 13m to front of me so i i went shipped out and flicked a few 8mm pellets over the top thumb float gone fish on and elastic ripping out got the fish under control and got it toward the keep nets as soon as it saw the keep nets off it went again this time i got it in and carp no 2 in the net happy days. Straight back out again saw the float thunder under again carp no 3 in the in the net after a good scrap. looking at my 13m line in front it was now buzzing with fish (got the feeling of bag up times here at last!) out again fish on this time it ran for it after 5 mins back came the float at a great rate on knots with no fish. Ok of back out this time I managed to get it to the keep nets got its head up and could clearly see it was caught in the lip as soon as it saw the keep nets of it went this time it snapped me.
This now went on catching the odd one getting snapped up by others this saw me adjust my rig from 0.16mm size 16 hook to 0.18mm size 14 hook as i had lost 6 carp in a row!
with the adjustments made i shipped out again waited float gone yet again into another fish didn't take long before the fish was landed. What i did notice was the fish were running as soon as they saw the keep nets so i upped the elastic from black hydro to purple slackened off.
This helped me land a few more fish but as before yet again i was snapped good and proper having looked at my watch i had 15 mins left so instead of re-rigging i shipped out with the shallow rig as every time i had flicked 8mm pellets there were signs of fish shallow this saw me land one more carp just in time for the all out.
Having a quick 2 mins to myself i had counted i had lost around about 15 carp! all decent sizes between 7-14lb i just sat there gutted knowing full well i had thrown away a section win if i had of netted them all.
With the weigh in taking place i packed my gear and waited to be weighed in grand total of 49lb went on the scales having looked at the board winning weight was 137lb that made it worse as i knew i had lost over 100lb of fish.
Having got back to the car park it was happy to find out i had finished 3rd in the silver pools by default so at least a bit of money was coming my way lol
Having looked back at why i lost so many fish i just couldn't net them first time round when i had the chance i also think i went in a bit too light rig wise lesson learned this time round. 
