August 6, 2010

• Rolf’s Lake. Holton. Oxfordshire.

  Dave the Fish’s

  Invitation Match.

  

  Well today I’m once again making the trip down to Rolfs Lake for an invitation match organised by Dave the Fish as a prequel to the Maggotdrowning.com Rolfs Pairs Tournament 2010. This has become something of an annual event fished by a number of those that will be fishing at the weekend and a few that won’t. It’s a nice light hearted match, fully in keeping with the Maggotdrowning ethos that allows everyone to settle in for the weekend ahead with plenty of time to spare .
  
  I’d been looking forward to this with a keen sense of anticipation for a few weeks prior to the event, but had a bit of a shock on Thursday when I got a phone call from Dave(Webbo) informing me that he’d been unable to get any trophies for the Pairs Match, and asking me if there was anything I could do to remedy the situation Fortunately there is a company local to me who deal in nothing other than trophies and a quick trip down to their shop sorted the problem, so a big THANK YOU to Alan Clarke and his staff at CLASSIC TROPHIES for getting us out of the brown sticky stuff at very short notice .
  

  

   It was a bit of a dull grey day with a hint of drizzle in the air when I woke up on Friday morning, so with the car loaded with all my gear, including the extras necessary needed for a 3 day stay it was off to Battersea for breakfast before driving through London to reach the M40, Thankfully this went amazingly well and I pulled into the fishery car park just after 10am . Geoff P and Mick the Chippy were already in situ as were our hosts for the weekend ahead John & Pauline. First things first, so I soon got my bivvie erected as it was obvious that we were going to get some rain at some point in the day. With that out of the way and the car park staring to fill as others arrived I gave Mick a hand with his bivvie. Like many of us, not being a hardened carper the bivvie only comes out for the annual trip to Rolfs and remembering where all the rods go takes a while. we got there in the end though .
  
  By now the car park was filling up, Dai had brought his caravan, along with his wife Anne, daughter Hayley and the dog, while Malc had Liam and Crystal in tow. Now Malc had invested the large sum of £14 in a new 4 man tent and was trying to erect it for the 1st time with the aid of the kids and Hayley, unfortunately the only instructions were a single photo of what it should look like, Despite showing him how to fit the supporting poles, you could tell it wasn’t going well when Hayley told Malc to “Step away from the tent” and as she had a mallet in her hand  it seemed like a good idea at the time . I then got a phone call from Paul(nomorelongwalks)East who had pulled out due to a family commitment, and he told me that the arrangement had been cancelled so he was coming down later anyway for a weekend with the gang despite not being able to fish .
  
  Chris(cybermanc)Ellis and Tom(tommodiesel)Little had arrived early to set up as they were fishing The Pairs at the weekend, but Dave invited them to fish today as they’d arrived ahead of schedule so there were 19 of us ready to go when Dave called for the draw around 12·30pm despite a few of the attendees being caught up in M40 traffic . We were going to fish from 2·15 – 7·15pm anyway so Pauline drew for those missing.
  Into the draw bag and I found peg 28 on the car park bank would be my home for 5 hours, a nice short walk and a peg I hadn’t fished before……
  

  

   John had mentioned that today looked ideal for the feeder and that seemed as good a starting point as any especially as I had it already set up in its rod sleeve. Pole wise I just set up a couple of Malman Adam 4×12′s on 0·20 with a size 14 Guru QM1′s for fishing to the bushes on either side and a Malman 4×12 Snake IV on 0·20 with a size 14 Guru QM1 for a line at 5mtrs. Bait for the session would be a variety of hard fishery pellets, corn and GOT Baits soft hookers.
  
  Simps, Gem and Budgie had made it in time for the start so it was a full compliment of 19 by the time that Dave signalled the All-In with what sounded like a strangled duck . Geoff over on peg 10 soon had a few feet of orange Vespe coming from his pole and was soon off the mark with the 1st Carp of the weekend .
  
  I managed a quick Carp on the feeder, a Mirror of around 7lbs to get me off the mark, while Simps was soon out onto the pole line and got a decent 16lb’er to get him off the mark, but it was Dave on peg 24 who seemed to get off to the best start fishing the pellet cone or “Feederless Feeder” as he calls it, it seemed to be doing the business today as a succession of fish came to the net ……

  

   Gem was on peg 9 and after her customary shout signalling her 1st fish had a lot of us worried about a Minxing as it’s a peg capable of producing a good weight, as Gem had proved taking a ‘Ton+’ and a load of scalps off of it a couple of weeks ago in a Jinx Match …….
  

  

  Well things didn’t get any better for me with nothing further to show on the feeder or all 3 pole lines apart from foul hooking a rather angry Carp in the tail. This gave me a good run around but I thought I was in with a chance of landing it, unfortunately as I piled on the pressure in an attempt to net it the line close to the hook parted shooting the rest of the rig back towards me and embedding the float into the middle finger of my right hand . Looking at it with a degree of shock I decided that it shouldn’t really be there and pulled it straight out only to be rewarded with the sight of large amounts of blood pouring out of my battered digit. Luckily Maria has always insisted that I carry a small first aid kit in my carryall for just this type of event so I was able to staunch the flow and bandage it up .

  So with nothing else having come my way after 2½ hours so I decided to fill it in on the 5mtr line and go for a stroll with the camera. I passed a rather disconsolate Tom(Tommodiesel)Little on peg 30 who was fishless  …….
  

  

  ……. and found Clive on peg 32, now this peg is starting to haunt Clive like peg 13 haunts me, and I have to say that Clive had the look of a man resigned to a Minxing  and just going through the motions as he could see that he was falling behind Gem who was directly opposite him …….
  

  

  Mick was on peg 34 and was having a bit of a struggle getting to grips with it today, but was plugging away and putting his faith in Mary Q to turn things round …….
  

  

   Malc was tucked away down on peg 38 and had Liam and Crystal to keep him company and maybe bring him some luck……
  

  

   ………. strangely Malc was fishing the feeder , a surprising site as he normally fishes the pole all the time at Rolfs but it appeared to be working for him as he was into a run of Carp on it …….
  

  

   Budgie on peg 40 was nowhere to be seen, which summed up the way his match was going , while Dai was on peg 2 and putting a few together, but just glad to be there after suffering concussion having cracked his head on the tailgate of Geoff’s car the previous weekend  ……
  

  

   Chris Withall was having a real struggle on peg 4 and had resorted to fishing the waggler and maggot for anything with fins to put some fish in the net …….
  

  

  peg 6 found Dave Moore wrapped up in his hoodie, not in the best of health, he probably shouldn’t have been fishing and the sport wasn’t exactly providing the tonic he needed …….
  

  

   Terry had finally managed a half decent draw in peg 7 but the residents had obviously heard of his previous exploits this season and decided to heap a bit more suffering on him leaving him facing a sixth Minxing on the trot …….
  

  

  ……. while Scott(methodgob) had run to peg 8 only to find that he needn’t have rushed as the fish were making him work hard for each one of them …….
  

  

   By the time I arrived back at my peg Paul had arrived and came over to say Hello, I was also rewarded with a bite! not the hoped for Carp, but a decent skimmer that was soon safely in the net and it was soon followed by another, and such fish can save a Minxing on a hard day . Over on my Nemesis peg 13  Chris(Cybermanc) was getting a few, but losing to many for his liking ……
  

  

  Dave over on peg 14 was suffering a bit of a grueller, I reckon it was the sound of that strangled duck at the start had scared his fish off ……
  

  

   All the action seem to be coming from the pegs to the right of me though, Simon was playing catch up with Dave who was still getting regular fish, and while Simon was getting quite a few foul hookers from his 5mtr line he was landing quite a few of them……

  

   However Ant over on peg 18 was coming on strong with a good run of fish late on and Steve(steak) on peg 22 was quietly getting on with things fishing worm and avoiding the foul hookers that were causing havoc for most ……

  

  I’d managed one more Carp by the time that Paul came back to see how I was doing. No sooner had he sat down behind me than I latched into a foul hooker that went tearing off across the lake taking my rig with it. I remarked to Paul that I couldn’t be bothered to set up another rig with 45 minutes to go so just dropped my feeder rig onto the 5mtr line with a single grain of corn on the hook. Well the tip wrapped round almost instantly and I soon had another carp in the net and I managed another six before Dave found that strangled duck again to sound the All-Out. I have to say that I was quite surprised to have finished so well and though I had 50lbs+ which just might save me from a Minxing .
  
  So with the gear packed away it was time for the Weigh-In and Malc soon set the pace with 73¾lbs to easily win his section, after which it was a tale of woe for many with the next weight of any relevance to most being Gem’s who set the mark of 52¼lbs + to avoid a Minxing. The Minxed List grew until the scales reached Ant who recorded the first Ton of the day with 109¼lbs, good enough for 3rd on the day  and just pipping Steve who weighed 108½lbs. Round to Dave who was well chuffed with his 136½lbs, but it was only good enough for 2nd   as Simon took a fine win recording 144½lbs . My late run of fish resulted in a weight of 62lbs for me so no Minxing for me today and a surprise section win as a bonus . THANK YOU to Dave the Fish for todays Invite , an enjoyable match regardless of the weights and a great way to kick off the weekend .
  
  So with everything out of the way it was back to the bivvies as the barbecue and various cookers were fired up, beers were opened and the inquest on the days events were discussed along with the prospects for the weekend ahead. It went on long into the night for some, and was still going when I rolled into my sleeping bag just after midnight and it didn’t take long before I was sound asleep.
  What would lie ahead? It wouldn’t be long till we found out .

  Position	Peg	Angler	Weight
  1st	26	Simon Mound	144lbs 08ozs
  2nd	24	Dave Webster	136lbs 04ozs
  3rd	18	Ant Haywood	109lbs 04ozs
  4th	22	Steve Akal	108lbs 08ozs
  5th	38	Malc Doyle	73lbs 12ozs
  6th	28	Peter Morton	62lbs 00ozs
  7th	2	Dai Thomas	56lbs 04ozs
  8th	9	Gem Doyle	52lbs 12ozs
  9th	32	Clive Pritchard	46lbs 00ozs
  10th	8	Scott Weston	44lbs 04ozs
  11th	13	Chris Ellis	42lbs 04ozs
  12th	10	Geoff Palmer	37lbs 04ozs
  13th	34	Mick Pearson	33lbs 08ozs
  14th	14	Dave Collier	31lbs 00ozs
  15th	7	Terry Goff	29lbs 12ozs
  16th	6	Dave Moore	26lbs 04ozs
  17th	4	Chris Withall	19lbs 04ozs
  18th=	40	Marcus Burgess	DNW
  18th=	30	Tom Little	DNW

  

  

   

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