A Charity Match in support of
with support from
Well today was the day for a Charity match organised by Vince Gould with a little bit of help from myself, taking place at Monk Lakes at Marden in Kent supporting the fund raising efforts of Disabled-Angler.co.uk for Macmillan Cancer Support & Rainbows the East Midlands Children’s Hospice, and hopefully with nearly 40 anglers booked in we would raise a few quid for the charities.
Loading up the car didn’t bode well. A solid grey sky was already dropping rain and with 4 large boxes of Braham & Murray Pure Hemp products to load up along with my gear, the car was a little full to say the least.
A phone call from Dirk as I drove down to the venue informing me that he was held up on the M25 and might be late, wasn’t good either. Arriving about 8am I met up with Vince and it was soon obvious that despite the weather most had made it. Simon Edwards had endured the TomTom trip from hell on the way down from Northampton as it warned him about the M25 hold up and diverted him through Central London!!!!!
9 am and Dirk arrived just in time for the draw, which saw a few £1 side bets placed, with Vince and Paul East joining in with Dirk and myself, for a four-way battle of the £1 coins and bragging rights. Peg 75 on the causeway was to be my peg for the match.
with Vince and Dirk in the 60′s on the other side of the causeway while Paul, Clive and Alan were opposite me on the far bank. To my right I had Simon and to my left young Nick Allen.
With plenty of time to set up prior to the 11am start I set up 3 pole rigs, a 4X14 KC Carpa Tricky on 0·14 Antares Silk Shock with size 18 Drennan Carp Match hook to fish at dead depth which would cover from 5mtrs to 13 mtrs due to the even bottom, a 4X12 KC Carpa dibber on 0·16 Antares Silk Shock with size 18 Drennan Carp Match hook for up in the water, and a 4X12 KC Carpa Shelf on 0·16 Antares Silk Shock with size 16 Drennan Carp Match hook for the margins. I also set up the pellet waggler (though I felt the conditions would rule it out today) and a feeder rod as a get out of jail option, however I’d forgotten my cage feeders, but fortunately I managed to borrow one from Vince. Bait wise for me, with it being the middle of May it was pellet, pellet and more pellet, with some meat as a change bait. Simon however was committing mass murder on a bait box full of worm & caster with some Atomic and hemp added for good measure!!!!!!
11am and with Vince blowing the whistle for the start I fed a pot of mixed pellet on the 11mtr and 5mtr lines and fed the margins by hand. Meanwhile young Nick had already landed his 1st fish and was into a second. Simon lost the 1st fish he hooked as a Skimmer did a passable impression of a Trout and shed the hook as it took off however he was soon into a few fish.
I was really struggling to buy a bite but finally got off the mark with a F1 of about a pound. However I couldn’t put a run of fish together unlike Nick and Simon who were catching regularly and a combination of a cold NE wind and the rain made conditions unpleasant to say the least (Strange how it never bothers you if you’re catching) but at least I had the wind off my back.
After about 2 hours of going nowhere fast I re-fed my pole lines and got up for a leg stretch and popped down to see how others were doing.
Vince was huddled under his brolly trying to escape the wind and rain that was blowing straight into his bank and was fishing the feeder………
but although he was admitting to around 15lbs in the net, was having trouble as his bites seemed to be very finicky.
Dirk was a couple of pegs further down, and was starting to wonder why he’d made the trip down from Rugby? He’s enjoyed his previous visits to Monks and had won his section the last couple of times, but sitting there with the wind blowing straight into him and his hands starting to lose all feeling, it was turning into a struggle as he had to go out to 14½ mtrs just to find a bite.
Meanwhile Matt Love, just behind Dirk was suffering as well, despite having won a match on the lake the previous Saturday with a fine bag of 114lbs fishing the pellet up in the water, it wasn’t working for him today however and he’d reverted to a method feeder to see if it would bring him a few fish.
Back at my peg, there was still no action on any of my pole lines and I decided that the feeder was the way to go with soaked 4mm pellet in the feeder and a hair rigged banded 8mm hard pellet for bait…………
After about 10 minutes I was rewarded as the tip wrapped round and after a short fight, a nice Mirror of around 3lb was welcomed to the net.
Looking across I could see that the far bank was struggling with nobody getting anything other than the occasional fish. Paul was sticking at it and seemed to be concentrating on his margin swim in an effort to put a few together…….
While Clive appeared to be alternating his approach between the margin and his line straight out in front, though apparently for little reward……
Meanwhile a few more Carp and F1′s along with a couple of Barbel kept things ticking over for me, though I won’t pretend that I wasn’t pleased to hear Vince blowing the whistle to signal the end of the match at 4pm.
The weigh in soon confirmed that I was about as close to a bit of Cod as I could be (Battered both sides) with Nick to my left weighing 73¾lbs for the match win and Simon to my right putting 52½lbs on the scales to eclipse my 34¼lbs and take my £1. However every cloud they say has a silver lining, and on this occasion I had the pleasure of relieving Vince, Dirk and Paul of their £1 coins.
Back to the car park for the presentations it was generally agreed that the fishing had been as hard as most could remember given the time of year, However the aim of the match had been achieved with £540 in total being raised for the Charities and all the anglers taking away some Braham & Murray Hemp Products for their efforts, so a big vote of Thanks to all those that attended.
Chatting in the car park as we all set off for home, I remembered something in my pocket that I handed back to Vince with my thanks, Yes the cage feeder that he’d lent me and enabled me to take his £1. His face was a picture and I can’t repeat what he actually said to me.
| TOP 20 | ||
| Position | Angler | Weight |
| 1st | Nick Allen | 73lbs 12ozs |
| 2nd | Phil Brice | 66lbs 08ozs |
| 3rd | Peter Allen | 63lbs 12ozs |
| 4th | Graham Flynn | 62lbs 00ozs |
| 5th | Ian Carley | 61lbs 00ozs |
| 6th | John Haigh | 58lbs 00ozs |
| 7th | James North | 52lbs 12ozs |
| 8th | Simon Edwards | 52lbs 08ozs |
| 9th | Dennis Price | 50lbs 12ozs |
| 10th | Trevor Little | 46lbs 00ozs |
| 11th | Dave Barr | 36lbs 08ozs |
| 12th | Peter Morton | 34lbs 04ozs |
| 13th | Gary Cross | 34lbs 02ozs |
| 14th | S Holden | 33lbs 12ozs |
| 15th | Simon Elsey | 32lbs 08ozs |
| 16th | Jeff Driscoll | 32lbs 00ozs |
| 17th | Alan Loader | 30lbs 08ozs |
| 18th | Mike Jameson | 28lbs 04ozs |
| 19th | Vince Gould | 27lbs 06ozs |
| 20th | Matt Love | 27lbs 04ozs |
| Section 1 | Phil Brice | 66lbs 08ozs |
| John Haigh | 58lbs 00ozs | |
| Section 2 | Peter Allen | 63lbs 12ozs |
| Graham Flynn | 62lbs 00ozs | |
| Section 3 | Nick Allen | 73lbs 12ozs |
| Simon Edwards | 52lbs 08ozs | |
| Section 4 | Alan Loader | 30lbs 08ozs |
| Clive Pritchard | 21lbs 08ozs |
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