Bristol PSV Fishing Club: Viaduct, Campbell, 16 March (20 pegs)

Another pleasant day, not as warm as last Sunday and a bit breezier but after the crappy wet winter we've had any bit of sunshine is more than welcome.

20 fishing today, which is a good number as it makes the maths easy!

Payout today was to be top 4 and 2 silvers as there was no Kev Jefferies and I was hoping for some good weights seeing as the recent warm weather had got the resident carp into feeding mode and hopefully they would be spreading out a bit now that the winter pellet ban had been lifted.

As for my match it was cursed from the start as I left home without my fishing hat which has been firmly attached to my head for every match since before I had grey hair, except for one match last year down at Landsend when Bob Warren had left his behind and it was pissing down with rain so, against my better judgement, I let him borrow it and he kicked my arse off the next peg

which was a first as far as I remember.

Following on from that initial disaster, at the draw there were two tickets left in the back of the fishing bus and Will Dearlove had decided he was going to have the last one despite the fact that I always have the last peg.

So seeing as Will had dug his size 6 Cuban heels in and wasn't going to give in I let him have the last one and he drew peg 116 and I ended up with 131 and even Steve Long in the shop couldn't come up with something positive to say about that draw so that was disaster #2.

But that won't be happening again as I will be having the last peg from now on no matter how much of a stalemate there is.

And I noticed that even Tony Rixon has cottoned on to this as he had the last peg at Landsend yesterday and drew 19!

Anyway, arriving at the peg it was looking even less promising as the water was quite clear and there was no sign of anything (carpy) moving, although there was a bit of fizzing at 11m which I guessed / was hoping would be skimmers.

For company I had Stewart Riddle on 132 and Steve O Toole on 130.

Rich Britton was on 129 and I expected him to do the best out of these 4 pegs.

I hadn't prepped any kit on the night before as i never seem to do any good when i turn up organised so I just set up a lead rod and a full-depth wag outfit (both for a banded 8mm pellet,

Which left me just enough time to set up a pole rig for the 11m line to fish last week's maggots over last week's micros.

And I had a shallow pellet rig in reserve just in csse!

At the "all-in" I fed the pole line with a pot full of maggots and micros and went out on the wag.

Derek Lucas, opposite on 111 landed a carp straight away, much to the disgust of his neighbour for the second week in a row, Brian Shanks and with others further up the lake also catching, I resigned myself to a day of spectating but the float went under and carp #1 gave itself up.

Carp #2 followed shortly along with a third by the end of the first hour leading me to believe there was hope but it was short-lived (a "false dawn" as they say)!

Nothing further followed on the wag or the lead and a half-hearted switch to the shallow wag also produced nothing.

Steve and Rich Britton were doing a little better but not a lot, and Stewart was doing his best to moan a carp out of peg 132 without success.

Opposite, Derek had failed to build on his flying start whereas Brian was catching a few on the pole shallow and giving him (and Chris Szakacs) a repeat of last weeks fishing lesson at Trinity.

Keith in 110 was slso struggling but all the pegs further up the lake were catching.

By now Stewart had given up fishing for non-existant carp and was out on the pole with an ultra-light rig for skimmers which could only have one inevitable result and sure enough he was soon having a torrid time!

My 11m line was only any good for "blade" roach so I gave it up and resigned myself to catching the same stamp of fish on my topkit either side of my nets just to keep myself occupied and to use up last week's maggots and micros.

This proved to be quite successful with a bite every put-in but unfortunately it takes a lot of roach to make up a good silvers weight when they average 4 to an ounce and when the "bonus" 2-ouncers fall off mid swing it can be a tad frustrating!

So I got fed up and slung the last of the micros in to my right margin and put 2 maggots on the hook which produced my fifth and final carp of the day.

My five carp went to 30lbs-ish and with my collection of roach and perch fry went a total of 34-0 for absolutely nowhere but I had faired better than the other three pegs at this end.

Stewart was long gone and both Keith and Derek in 110 & 111 had tipped back.

I didn't follow the scales round as, despite not being able to see a great deal from my peg, I had a good idea what had been caught from the Bankside Telegraph and also the fact that a few anglers had wandered down our end to borrow extra nets which was a bit of a giveaway.

The match was won by Rocket Ron Hardiman with 201lbs 10oz from peg 118

It would have been a bit more but he had 7lbs knocked off of one his nets ... There's always one! Although there were actually two but I don't include Chris Szakacs as he does it every time he fishes at Viaduct (can't count past 10)

For the record Ron caught on meat and pellet on the lead and later with meat on the pole in close.

Second on the day was Will Dearlove with 145-1 caught from the peg I should have had, 116 (but I won't go on about it).

Will caught on meat on the full-depth wag, I think, but I'm sure he will correct that in the comments if it's wrong.

Third place went to Lee Waller with 134-5 caught on the pole with pellet from peg 126
And in fourth place was a much improved Matt Taynton with 129-3 from peg 127.

Full Result: