Match: TBF Winter League (round1 )
Venue: Tunnel Barn Farm, Shrewley, Warks
Date: Saturday, 19th October
Angler: Shaun Little (MAP Designer and Consultant)
After months of anticipation the start of
my winter league fishing had finally arrived, the first of these being the Tunnel
Barn Winter League that is widely regarded as one of the toughest commercial leagues in
the country. This year would be no different, with 19 teams of four entered and with
the likes of Steve Ringer, Des Shipp and Jamie Hughes fishing it (to name just a
few) it would obviously be a very difficult league indeed.
I’m a massive fan of winter fishing, hence
most of my fishing is participated during this time. I know many people associate
this time of year with the drawbag playing more of a part than any actual
angling skill – I don’t believe that by the way – but I find that if you are
prepared to work that little bit harder and think that little bit longer than
the anglers around you, the rewards will speak for themselves.
Anyway, that’s my philosophy; onto the
winter league.
I had been fishing the odd match to get a
feel for the venue again in between working tradeshows and getting an earful
off the missus for never being around. As a team we felt we were on track,
until the usual British weather turned that upside down; the temperature
dropped and it lashed it down. So a mid-week trip was called for and the team
player that I am, I offered to go at sit in the rain all day working things out.
I drew 31 on House pool and for those of
you who know Tunnel Barn, this is a decent peg and with 30 not in it’s even
better. The aim of the day was to
establish if maggots or pellets would be the preferred bait. As a brief
overview, it fished incredibly hard with maggots outperforming pellets by far… 58lb
won the match and as some people I know would say, I was the first ‘loser’ with
55lb. More importantly though, I had gained important knowledge and confidence for
the forthcoming winter league round.
Or had I….
That night the team calls were made to teammates Mark Malin, Aiden Mansfield and Kurtis Trantor, and the
knowledge spread around. That was Wednesday; air temperature 12 degrees.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday air temperatures were between 15-17 degrees –
bollocks! But more of the effects of that later…
The night before the match anticipation was
running through my mind as I was putting the finishing touches to my gear. This
is what’s great about this time of year, you just can’t predict what will
happen. Will I be fishing for 100lb or 40lb? What bait, depth, shotting pattern
or feeding pattern will work best? These are all questions that are hardest to
answer at this time of year.
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| Tunnel Barn Farm is one of the most popular venues in the UK and its winter league attracts some of the best anglers there are. |
The morning of the first round arrived. I
woke up to my alarm and it was still dark, the first sign that the winter
league season is here. As I left the house I was greeted by a typical autumn
morning; overcast, damp yet surprisingly warm.
As a team we opted to get there as early as possible to get in the draw
bag before all the flyers were gone (Match Fishing magazine’s Joe Carass
usually grabs one of those!). With the team draw made we had two great pegs in
the shape of New Pool 25, occupied by yours truly, and Extension 21 to which
the smile on Mark Malin’s face said it all. The other two pegs were below
average in my opinion; Top Pool 8 and House 1. Both these sections are split
with Club Pool and at this time of year it’s almost impossible to compete
against the other lakes that stand alone. But that was the draw, no point in
crying over spilt milk as they say. A positive attitude is a must regardless of
the draw and in team matches, damage limitation is imperative off the bad pegs
because every team will have one or two duff pegs.
Moving on to my peg, New Pool is an oddly-shaped
snake lake that meanders its way around itself. Peg 25 is on the ‘road bank’,
which is a long straight and also one of the widest parts of the lake at
15-metres. At this time of year I think this is always an advantage, as it
offers a lot more water to target and brings options to explore.
Upon arriving at my peg I had a scout around
to see who was in my section; Jamie Hughes and Mark Pollard were two I had to
deal with. It’s never easy in this league with the caliber of anglers that
enter.
The plan of attack was pretty simple and although
I had caught well on maggots in the week with the weather warming up, I opted
to start on pellets. My opening line was plumbed up at five sections straight
in front of me, which is about six inches deeper than the rest of the peg. It’s
so important to spend that little extra time plumbing around the whole peg to
get a feel for the features and contours before making a decision on where to
fish. The next line was at 3.5ft deep and I just plumbed around on the far bank
until I found that depth. After a lot of rain sometimes the fish like to sit
off the bottom and working a rig up and down the far slope can really be the
difference. The third line was set at two feet deep, tight to the far bank,
which also doubled-up perfectly with my inside to the next pallet.
At the whistle I compressed 30 micro
pellets into my bottle top pot and slipped a 4mm expander on the hook then shipped
out to my five-section line. My thinking was to start off negative in terms of
feed and judge it from there. After five minutes of regular lifting and
dropping, the floats dipped and the first F1 was hooked and safely netted. The
swim looked like it was going to improve but after three fish, the activity
tailed off. Confident that the fish were there but requiring more feed I
started to introduce a full pot; this resulted in a few fish but again it just
died. I reverted back to feeding 30 pellets and it did the trick; 10 fish came
to the net, all near the 1lb 8oz mark and giving me a good enough weight to
keep up with the other anglers in the section. By feeding like this I was able
to keep my short line fishing longer than everyone around me.
As always though there comes a point where
you are having to work harder and harder for a bite and its vital to know when
it’s time to move on. I’d had 15 fish and felt reassured I would catch on my
other lines. The original plan was to feed maggot by hand over my five-section
line once I came off it, but it seemed too much of a risk given how the first
hour had fished and if the other lines didn’t fish then I’d be screwed… and how
right I was; after 45 minutes of trying my other lines I just couldn’t string
any fish together.
This was the pattern for the rest of the
match; I had to keep reverting back to my five-section line, have four or five
fish then rotate around my other lines picking odd fish up. By ‘big potting’
maggots tight across I managed to snare a 8lb ghostie, although I wouldn’t
normally do that at this time of year but sometimes when a swim isn’t working a
calculated risk can pay off. As the all-out whistle sounded I had around 38
fish, which I felt would maybe push 70lb. At the start I would have taken 60lb
so I felt reasonably content. When the scales arrived Jamie Hughes was winning
the lake with a fantastic 87lb off an unfancied peg – what a performance! I
placed 77lb on the scales, which was good enough for second on the lake and in
the section. The warmer, more consistent weather of the previous few days had
clearly made a big difference to the fish. If I had been on the same peg on
Wednesday I feel I would struggled for 60lb.
It was now a case of anxiously ringing
around the lads to see they had got on. Mark had done the job finishing fourth
on his lake, Aiden & Kurtis were a little more downbeat, both coming mid-way
in their sections. Come the all-important final placing the general consensus
was that we would be about halfway out of the 19 teams. As the teams were read
out from last to first our smiles gradually grow as more and more teams were
read out. Eventually it came to us – MAP/Bait Tech was shouted out in
fourth place overall, just two points behind the third-placed team. This just
goes to reiterate my earlier point that it’s all about damage limitation from
those bad draws and that’s exactly what the lads had done.
That match was only the first round – there
are nine more to go in the league – and there’s no guarantee that we’ll
get those all-important better draws over the forthcoming rounds, we can only
hope.
Just before I sign off I have to say a
massive well done to Joe Carass and his team; not only did he win the match outright
but also his team wiped the floor with a massive 70 point score… well done guys.
Here’s to the next round and I’ll
definitely keep you posted…
Shaun Little
MAP Designer and consultant
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