I recently spent two weeks at White Acres fishing the Maver festival and the following Preston festival, the latter being a qualifier for the Parkdean final where the top twenty four Anglers battle it out for the £25k top prize on Jenny’s Lake.

Now I treat this as a bit of an holiday, as I have usually have had enough stress and pressure through the summer months, fishing the World champs and European champs , so once these festivals arrive I try to relax and just enjoy the fishing and if I win something on the way all well and good. For company I had Sandra and my son Oliver who were also fishing the matches, so we would have plenty to talk about over dinner in the evenings.

I had been fishing most of the week before representing Ultimate Barnsley in the World club champs qualifier on the Trent where we finished second to Starlets losing by just one and a half points. I was feeling a little jaded by the time I got to the draw for the Maver, but that’s another story, so back to my first day and peg 33 on Twin Oaks was my destination.

I must admit I knew I had a task on my hands to win the section from this peg as pegs 21 to 29 usually dominate this section and on peg 21 was Paul Holland who was unlikely to make a mistake. I have learnt to fish for second as a good drop result, you only need four results to count, but a good drop result can win you the competition. So rather than go in all guns blazing, I now try to take the fish that are available instead of trying to catch what’s not there.

At this end of the Lake there are usually lots of F1s, so I started in just 2ft 6inch of water on a top two of my pole with just one section on, also fishing at 2 o’clock so not to spook any fish while playing a hooked fish in front of me. I fed this line with a mix of Chopped worm and casters and Sensas Crazy bait marine, mixed into a slop to draw in the F1s and catch any silvers that turned up as well. Elastic choice was also important, catching mixed fish calls for soft elastic so Drennan Green Hollow core is spot on, it would also stand up to landing a double figure Carp if I hooked one.

My next swim was directly in front where I could throw 4mil pellets to about 5metres and I started this line off with half a 250mil Drennan pot of four mil pellets and fed 8 pellets every minute to keep the swim topped up. I then needed an attacking line which with little wind I fed at 14.50meters with catapulted 6mil pellets in the hope to catch shallow. For the edge line I cut the left hand margin swim out through the rushes so I could get close to the bank and this was to be a meat line for Carp if they turned up in the later stages. I always carry a set of shears to do this, such is the importance of being tight to the bank.

Starting at 2.0’clock with one section on in 2ft 6inches of water and feeding small amounts of my groundbait slope mix with a cad pot , I amassed about 20lbs of F1s and silvers before it started to slow. Then fishing small pieces of caster size Dendrobaena on a B911 F1 hook to 0.13 Polemaster fluorocarbon hook length kept the fish coming. I then moved out to the pellet line but kept feeding the short line with small balls of my mix so I could return to this line later. I had problems with silvers attacking the 4mil expander hook bait so I moved up to a 6mil expander. This did the trick and after two hours all was going well with forty pounds in the net. I fished these two lines to the end of the match as I only caught 2F1s from my shallow line and no Carp showed up on the meat margin swim.

When the scales arrived my 81lb was easily second in the section with Paul winning with a terrific 120lb catch. I didn’t have a single carp, just F1s and silvers but felt I had fished a good match to get the result. You may ask why I didn’t throw the method at some point, but in flat calm sunny conditions I felt this would initially catch but would fizzle out quickly.

My next day was to be at Porth reservoir and it had fished well in the 70s section with plenty of Bream caught on the first day. I drew in the 30s section on peg 32, again not such a good peg in the section as 36 to 40 normally dominate this area. Undeterred I set up a small Drennan flatbed cage feeder with 20grams of extra lead glued to it to fish for Skimmers at 25yards with a mix of Sensas Crazy bait Marine and Magic and chopped worms. I also balled it in with a sweet mix of Sensas Gross Gardons and Canal Black at 11meters for Roach; I intended to loose feed maggots over this area.

Starting on the feeder I caught six small Skimmers, but lost two more better fish to Pike which is most annoying as it’s always the bigger fish they take. A switch to the pole line and I slowly started to catch Roach but they were tiny and not really coming fast enough. I was never really happy and needed to change something to try to catch some bigger fish. I really needed a few skimmers so I started to throw small balls of my fishmeal mix with chopped worms in it and a few Casters. The size of the Roach did improve slightly and by the end of the match I had added six more small skimmers. When the scales came I needed 10lb 30z to win the section, but my 9lb 5oz was only good enough for third. I felt a little gutted as I felt I made a couple of mistakes, one was not sitting far enough out in the lake and not feeding the groundbait early enough when I knew the fish were so small.

Wednesday soon arrived and this was to be the most exciting venue of the week and you could feel a real buzz at the draw. Bolingey is just a Carp lake and home to some real munters so everyone was full of expectation. I drew in the first arm peg 49 in open water, but in this section you can almost see all the anglers in your section so it’s possible to keep tabs on who is catching what, a big advantage when one fish can make all the difference.

After plumbing up very carefully, I decided that my first line would be at seven sections of pole at 2oclock, the bottom was flat at this point and I felt it was too shallow closer, so this is where I started with just a large cad pot of 10 pieces of Meat and the rest of the pot filled with hemp, I tipped it straight in and sat patiently for a bite. A couple of minutes went by before the float shot under and I lost my first Carp at the net, much to my disgust! I re-fed and soon hooked two more which I landed. I always start at this distance before moving out into the lake because as I find that there is always an odd Carp lurking close in. No real finesse with rigs here with 0.18mil main line to 0.168mil Double Strength hook length to a 16 B911 Kamasan hook with meat hook bait.

Once I had caught these early fish I moved out to 16 metre again slightly to the right of the peg as the bottom was really uneven in front of me. I think in the past on this lake I have always selected 14.5m and I think this has been a mistake as I caught much better on this occasion. I started this line again with the same bait in a cad pot and meat on the hook fishing dead depth with a 0.06gram new prototype Drennan float I’ve been involved in designing. After a few early fish it slowed, so I started to ping three or four pieces of meat over the top to entice a few fish into the peg but also to give me a chance to try shallow. With no bites shallow I just persevered on the bottom but all the time I was feeding the seven section line with catapulted Meat and went back on this line with 2hours to go. Two quick fish and I thought now I had a chance to win the section but no bites followed. I stayed on this line for a full half an hour for nothing but noticed that there were a few blows coming up on my long line that I had not fed for a while. A quick look out produced five in five drops in and some late fish short put me on 115lb for a section win and second on the lake, I was back in the hunt.

Day four was the Match lake Polwyn back on site, a section where you must target all species as they have lost a lot of the Carp that used to dominate this lake. My destination for the day was peg 13 and a good draw in the section but not much chance to win the lake from here. You must start for Carp and I normally fish for these at least for one hour before deciding what to do next. I started on a small Drennan method feeder with pellets and an eight mil pellet for hook bait and caught just one F1 so now I had to make a decision. A quick look at 16 meters where I had been potting Casters and meat produced 2 skimmers so I came back to 6meterswith four mil pellets fishing a 4mil pellet on the hook to catch skimmers.

Not to go into much detail, I caught on this line for most of the match trickling in 4mil pellets by hand, just looking out occasionally to see if any Carp had turned up on the long pole line. I could see a few of the anglers down my section and had only seen one carp caught. At the end I had amassed 70 skimmers, two small Barbel and two F1s for 39lb, a section win with 30lb being second. Only two Carp were caught in the entire section, so silvers are really important here. I always fish with a strung out rig for these skimmers as they are very difficult to catch and light 0.11hooks are a must.

I now had chance to at least make the top ten in the festival and with Jenny’s lake and Trewaters to fish I just needed a half reasonable draw. It came in the shape of peg4 on Jenny’s so all I needed now was to perform well. As I was rigging up I realised I had Lee Edwards in the section on peg six, he is a real class act so again, I knew I had a match on my hands. The peg I was on is in the open water so with no island to cast to I fancied it to catch F1s and Carassio on the method feeder. I set up two on my prototype 10ft Drennan Bomb rods, both 25gram feeders, one with a 0.128mil double strength hook length and the other with 0.148mil coupled with size 16 Drennan Carp Feeder hooks to fish maggots.

I also set a short pole for meat and a long pole with worms and casters in case I was in trouble and needed to catch Carp, I started the match on the method and finished on it, catching 100 fish for 96lb all on pellets on the feeder and maggots for hook bait. I knew Lee was catching well both Carp and F1s but just dare not put the feeder down as I am a big believer in Don’t Fix What Isn’t Broken!  Lee’s fish went 119lb so I was relegated to second, but it’s so difficult to call what’s happening when you are concentrating on your own match.

I had really enjoyed the weeks fishing and finished seventh overall, winning a few quid along the way, I felt that the only day I got it a little wrong was on Porth and ounces cost me two points, but felt I had fished well on the other days. Des Shipp put in another fault less display with 5section wins to fend off Steve Ringer. What an arena White Acres is and now I am looking forward to the second week’s fishing.

– Alan.