Quite a few of us headed to the Viaduct on Saturday for the open match, we went to a burger van in Yeovil for breakfast (big thanks to Part Time Priv for sorting it out) and very nice it was too. 18 anglers fishing today including Nigel Bartlett who has been dominating the silvers with some massive weights of skimmers to 90lb+.
Looking at recent results, a draw on the near bank was the place to be for silvers and when I reached the coffee tin of doom, nobody had drawn 112 yet which is a good one. Of course I pulled out 130 on the far bank and asking a few of regulars, nobody seemed very excited for me although I should still have a nice days fishing.
Parker ‘The Pole’ was next door on 129 with Nick a few pegs further along while Norts and Priv were opposite on 111 and 112 respectively. Duffers was also on the other bank on 121 and Nigel B drew 116.
I set up a couple of 4 x 14 Preston Innovations F1 Maggots for two lines at top five and another at 11.5 metres. On the side tray I had maggots, worms, micros, expanders, corn and some Bait-Tech Special G F1 Dark groundbait.
On the whistle I fed the 11.5 metre swim and short left hand line with some loose groundbait and then the right with a small ball of softened micros. Priv was into a big leaper straight away followed not long after by Norts who also landed a decent skimmer. I started short with double maggot but small roach were a problem and it was the same for Steve P.
After an hour I had rotated round all three of my lines and tried maggot, corn, expander and worm for the sum total of one decent roach and a few small ones. Priv and Norts on the other hand were both bagging and netting decent skimmers regularly. Going into hour two I finally hooked a nice skimbob on soft pellet from the right hand line and when I had another next chuck, I was hoping they’d moved in but then couldn’t get a bite!
That set the scene for the rest of the match really, I would get little runs of fish from the right hand swim but it felt like you needed to rest it and I couldn’t catch from the other two lines. I’ve only had one 2lb skimmer on double dead reds from the left and the 11.5 metre swim was a flop with just a couple of 8oz skimmers.
Although Priv slowed up a bit, Norts (our ex Club Angler of the Year) caught consistently all day. Carp started becoming an issue for all the silvers anglers towards the end of the match and I landed three for probably 25lb which I returned straight away. I finished up with 16 decent skimmers, a couple of smaller ones and a few roach which I thought would go around 32-35lb (if the skimmers averaged 2lb apiece along with the odd better one).
The scales began on our side with Mark Wynne on 132 who had 102lb, Mark Vigar on my right had 66lb which included 25lb of skimmers, my silvers only went 28lb 1oz (so they were smaller than I thought), Parker ‘The Pole’ had 11lb odd of silvers and Nick P weighed 20lb.
Back at the results and once again, Howard Webb had demonstrated the power of the peas with a massive 282lb for another match win and it was no surprise that Nigel topped the silvers again with a brilliant 85lb of skimmers. Also just to underline how sorted he’s got it, Nigel won the silvers the following day with 76lb, fair play mate, definitely the man to beat at the moment. Norts did brilliantly to finish second in the silvers with 44lb, Duffers had 36lb and Priv weighed 23lb. Photo’s courtesy of Viaduct Fishery*
Howard Webb won yet again, this time with a massive 282lb of carp*
Nigel Bartlett won the silvers comfortably with 85lb 7oz from peg 116*
Overall
1 – Howard Webb – 282lb – peg 125
2 – Phil Hardwick – 193lb 10oz – peg 115
Silvers
1 – Nigel Bartlett – 85lb 7oz – peg 116
2 – Chris Norton – 44lb – peg 111
Although I’ve had a nice days fishing, I was miles off the pace and didn’t get that right at all, I think I should have fed more at the start and throughout the day but I was worried about attracting too many carp. I should have fed a 13 metre line at the start rather than 11.5 metres and probably spent too long trying to catch on corn, maggot and worm when I’ve had most of my fish on soft pellet.
The Nugget-O-Meter did brilliantly thanks to very kind donations from Jenny and Nick (£7), Norts (£5) and me (£2) as the new total hit £396.
There’s still a great offer running if you fancy treating yourself to some new fishing gear, use the exclusive discount code AgainstMenandFish10 to get 10% off when you shop online at Somerset Angling
Also I still have copies of my book available from eBay here or Amazon here
And if you could spare five minutes to leave a nice review on Amazon, it would be very much appreciated.
Next up – Stathe Drain
Coming soon – Lots more match reports
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