I was so looking forward to this the first round of the new South Wales Summer League. The first match was to be held on one of my favourite venues Hartleton Lake just outside Ross on Wye.
A week before the match I'd been up for a look on a beautiful day and had a cracking day with plenty of Skimmers and Roach about. After a few phone calls to Luke we had formulated a plan for our makeshift team "The Jagers" to go at.
Come the day of the match however and everything change, in the days leading up to this we had had torrential rain storms which left the lake chocolate brown in colour and I knew the fishing would be difficult especially in the shallow waters at the top end where the brook feeds the lake.
Luke drew for us and pulled out peg one....the scales.....fantastic!! I then proceeded to pull out B1 which I thought was the start of the field. After half an hour of organised chaos I got to my peg having walked it from the car park due to the track up to the field becoming blocked with anglers dropping kit off.
I must admit disappointment when I got there as I was two pegs into the trees section with the rest of my section on the green bank of the field. I have spent a fair amount of time on this lake and knew straight away that my peg and Branson to my left were going to really struggle to compete with the pegs in the field as it is an area that never produces.
Still up and at them and I set up a method feeder, waggler and three pole rigs. Two for the long pole at 13m and one for a 5m Roach line.
It was a really windy day as well that didn't help matters one bit as trying to hold 13m of Carbon on a large lake in the wind is difficult to say the least.
My worst fears were becoming reality with an hour and a half into the match I was still biteless. I managed to put a few small skimmers in the net to weigh 2lb 8oz and last in the section. Branson next to me had fished the waggler all day for a pile of small roach to pip me then up in the field as predicted the weights were all over and about 8lb with 14lb winning the section.
Luke had faired worse with one bite for 8oz we also had a blank, Mike Martin did the best with 20lb of skimmers which was only good enough for 5th in his section! The bottom end in the deep water had fished fantastically with 50lb winning the match and several back up weights of 30lb +.
It was one of those days where I couldn't buy any bites, going through all the motions and experience of my days at Hartleton was to no avail.
It can be a cruel place at times, but I wont hold it against it and will still look forward to the next visit there!
Photo's are from the practise session where I got to try out my lovely new Browning micro waggler that performed superbly for a medium cast.
A week before the match I'd been up for a look on a beautiful day and had a cracking day with plenty of Skimmers and Roach about. After a few phone calls to Luke we had formulated a plan for our makeshift team "The Jagers" to go at.
Come the day of the match however and everything change, in the days leading up to this we had had torrential rain storms which left the lake chocolate brown in colour and I knew the fishing would be difficult especially in the shallow waters at the top end where the brook feeds the lake.
Luke drew for us and pulled out peg one....the scales.....fantastic!! I then proceeded to pull out B1 which I thought was the start of the field. After half an hour of organised chaos I got to my peg having walked it from the car park due to the track up to the field becoming blocked with anglers dropping kit off.
I must admit disappointment when I got there as I was two pegs into the trees section with the rest of my section on the green bank of the field. I have spent a fair amount of time on this lake and knew straight away that my peg and Branson to my left were going to really struggle to compete with the pegs in the field as it is an area that never produces.
Still up and at them and I set up a method feeder, waggler and three pole rigs. Two for the long pole at 13m and one for a 5m Roach line.
It was a really windy day as well that didn't help matters one bit as trying to hold 13m of Carbon on a large lake in the wind is difficult to say the least.
My worst fears were becoming reality with an hour and a half into the match I was still biteless. I managed to put a few small skimmers in the net to weigh 2lb 8oz and last in the section. Branson next to me had fished the waggler all day for a pile of small roach to pip me then up in the field as predicted the weights were all over and about 8lb with 14lb winning the section.
Luke had faired worse with one bite for 8oz we also had a blank, Mike Martin did the best with 20lb of skimmers which was only good enough for 5th in his section! The bottom end in the deep water had fished fantastically with 50lb winning the match and several back up weights of 30lb +.
It was one of those days where I couldn't buy any bites, going through all the motions and experience of my days at Hartleton was to no avail.
It can be a cruel place at times, but I wont hold it against it and will still look forward to the next visit there!
Photo's are from the practise session where I got to try out my lovely new Browning micro waggler that performed superbly for a medium cast.