Rolf’s Lake. Holton. Oxfordshire. May 24th, 2007.

Polepot’s Rolf’s Rumble.

TalkAngling.co.uk Forum Match.

Well today was the day of Neil McMurran aka polepot’s TalkAngling match at Rolf’s Lake and by 9·30am the car-park had filled up as the 30 anglers booked in for the day arrived for the draw. With the sun beating out of a clear blue sky it promised to be a warm one and it was good to see Rolf himself in attendance as he had recently been into hospital.

As always these internet matches provide the opportunity to put faces to names normally only seen on computer screens, and invariably the banter flows and little side bets are made. Malc’s daughter Gemma has recently got back into fishing and already beaten a few good anglers leading to her being christened “The Minx” and a Minxed list has been published on a couple of websites detailing those anglers she’s beaten. We had a £1 sidebet on the day, but I must admit to having an ominous feeling that this could be the day I was added to the list after all the banter that had been flowing in the past couple of weeks.

Into the drawbag and peg37 stuck to my hand, not a bad draw normally on the little lake and as I made my way down there I saw that Mark C had 34, a noted flyer in the corner. 35 was vacant, on 36 I had polebreaker for company and on 38 matt6900 while further round on 40 was andy222 who had the misfortune to have Malc(The Jinx)Doyle for company on peg 1.

Setting up I was a little disappointed to have anglers on pegs either side as the pegs are reasonably tight leaving me without an option of a margin peg as such as there is little or no cover on the bankside there. I set up for just 2 lines, 1 at 12mtrs and 1 at 7mtrs, both hard on the deck with a spare rig for up in the water should it be needed.

11·30am and the all in saw me feed a large pot of Rolf’s feed pellets on both lines and ithen went out at 12mtrs with a GOT 11mm soft hooker. The float just sailed away and I was obviously attached to one of the resident carp. However Malc and Rolf walked past and after a bit of encouragement for Malc the rig came sailing back with just a scale attached.

There then followed 3hrs of absolute frustration as I was plagued by hordes of silvers. It didn’t matter what I put on the hook, Corn, Meat, Paste or Pellet in either 6 or 11mm, I couldn’t buy a bite from a Carp. Looking to my right I could see Mark C steadily putting a decent bag together from 34 alternating between the pole and feeder and even polebreaker was nicking a few………

Andy over on 40 was plugging on and sneaking the odd one or two out and looking forward to a better day than he’d had on a previous visit when is was unprepared for the strength and fighting power of the Rolf’s Carp……

 Malc was having yet more trouble getting to grips with Red Hydro and was having to do his best “Matt Nutt” impression in order to land some of the Carp, but at least he was catching which was more than I was managing ……

While over towards pegs 8 and 9 Fred and Griffo could be seen having a right old ding dong, both obviously heading towards what would prove to be decent bags……

Next door on 38 matt6900 had managed to get a reasonable Tench from his margin peg to his left and finally managed to get amongst a few lumps during the final couple of hours despite loosing one landing net head and breaking another……

While tucked away over in the opposite corner on peg3 Halfounce was making hay and quietly slipping more than a few fish into the net……

For my part, I finally managed an 11lb weigher and 3 smaller Carp, but it just didn’t happen, despite lashing the bait in I just couldn’t feed off the silvers and I finished the match with just 34lbs to show for my efforts.
Tony(Rive T)Walsh took the honours on the day with a fine Double Ton weighing 203lbs 11ozs, a bit of a change from his usual catches from canals.

 Halfounce ended up in 2nd place with 192lbs 09ozs while Fred came out just ahead in his peg to peg battle with Griffo with 187lbs 12ozs to 185lbs 09ozs.
Gemma managed 68lbs 06ozs to double my weight and take my £1 as well as add my scalp along with 9 others to “The Minxed List”.

So finally a big THANK YOU to Neil for organising a most enjoyable day in good company. Hopefully we’ll be able to do it again in the not to distant future.
I’m back at Rolf’s next Saturday on the 1st round of Malc’s Jinx Series, hopefully I’ll be able to avoid those silvers and find a few more carp then.

Position	Peg	Angler	Weight
1st	Peg 15	Tony(Rive T)Walsh	203lbs 11ozs
2nd	Peg 3	Halfounce	192lbs 09ozs
3rd	Peg 9	Fred	187lbs 12ozs
4th	Peg 8	Griffo	185lbs 09ozs
5th	Peg 23	Steve001	149lbs 04ozs
6th	Peg 13	dnw	147lbs 08ozs
7th	Peg 26	Martin B	144lbs 13ozs
8th	Peg 19	Clive	135lbs 10ozs
9th	Peg 34	Mark C	132lbs 00ozs
10th	Peg 31	Keith	130lbs 10ozs
11th	Peg 38	matt6900	126lbs 04ozs
12th	Peg 20	can’tdraw	107lbs 12ozs
13th	Peg 1	Malc	106lbs 09ozs
14th	Peg 40	andy222	92lbs 06ozs
15th	Peg 29	Dave A	89lbs 04ozs
16th	Peg 30	buckskinss	86lbs 02ozs
17th	Peg 11	MPO380	84lbs 11ozs
18th	Peg 28	Vince	69lbs 10ozs
19th	Peg 4	Ubat	69lbs 08ozs
20th	Peg 27	Gem	68lbs 06ozs
21st	Peg 36	polebreaker	64lbs 12ozs
22nd	Peg 21	cornerstone	64lbs 06ozs
23rd	Peg 14	Kingfisher	58lbs 08ozs
24th	Peg 2	Larry Teapot	53lbs 12ozs
25th	Peg 6	Ridgeacre	51lbs 13ozs
26th	Peg 10	Royst	51lbs 08ozs
27th	Peg 7	polepot	49lbs 06ozs
28th	Peg 32	Brian G	36lbs 06ozs
29th	Peg 37	Pete M	34lbs 00ozs
30th	Peg 22	leetwin	9lbs 00ozs