Just a 13 pegger today on the Old Match Lake at Ivy, travelled up with Tony and had breakfast there, it's not the cheapest, but it's nice.
Tony beat me to the draw tin as I wasn't paying attention, he pulled 12 - nice you can reach the island with 16m, somewhat disappointingly I drew 13 out of the tin, same peg as last time on the lake where I managed 3rd, but that time there was a silvers angler on 12, who never went near the island, that wasn't going to be the case today.
Rather sportingly I did help Tony get his pole (Daiwa) up to the full 16m limit, perhaps I should have just stayed quiet... Last time I was on this peg I caught most fish on the waggler, so that was first out of the bag, I did get a method feeder out, but that stayed led on the bank and went away unused.
Topkits for margin, a short line where I intended to fish 5mm pellets as if they were meat, a rig for banded pellet at 11m and a silvers rig, jut in case I had to fish for bites. Couldn't see the point in going long on the pole, as it's too far from the island, could probably do it with 17m and a metre of lash, but that's not allowed.
Started short on 8mm pellet hoping for 'mug' fish, but nothing, I'd fed two lines at 11m, 10 and 2 o'clock, GB/maggots on one, corn and micros on the other, the skimmers weren't queuing up and I probably spent 15 minutes too long trying to catch them whilst I primed the island to fish the waggler. I did have a couple of skimmers and two small carp on it, but by now Tony had shipped out to the island and was catching carp.
The difficulty in fishing the waggler to the island was the same as the last time I fished the peg, to get a bite, it had to right up on the mudline and not be dragged away by wind, surface trip (which there was very little of in all honesty) or the ducks that were attracted to the pellets.
I caught intermittently, as the fish would disappear after 2 or 3 had been caught, switching to the other lines was pretty much a non-start, even though the 5m line was fizzing, I tried worms over it as well, to no avail I did try worm on the waggler over to the island, I had one on it, but I felt pellet was better when the cast and presentation were right.
Finally the edge started to give up a couple of fish, not frantic, but 3 or 4 better fish in the last 30 minutes, including one landed after the whistle. I knew Tony had beaten me, he just caught more consistently across to the island. By the time the scales came round there had been a couple of ton weights and Stu on peg 10 added another, I didn't think I had that.
Tony's fish went on the scales and he'd somehow manged to get 42lb in one net and 83 in the other, losing the second net by exceeding 80lb. About 4 or 5 years ago we were pegged next to each other in a Viaduct winter league, I did exactly the same with the same weight over, that cost me a 96 peg match win, this cost Tony a 13 peg match win. I did have a ton, just over 105.10 which was enough for 3rd on the day, one out of the money, so a skint van going home....
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