Jefferies Cup, 05/11/2014

I was rudely awoken by my alarm at 0315 this morning so that I could drive across the country and take part in the Jefferies Cup at on the Nene in March.  It was an easy run at that time in the morning and I was soon enjoying a breakfast and waiting for the rest of the Army Teams to turn up.  The morning went too smoothly when I missed out on being a team captain and was soon having A8 thrust into my hand, in Army B was myself, Rikki, Bri and Gaz so we had half a chance if it was a good draw.

Kev said he knew the way so Craig, who was pegged next to me on A7, and I followed him to the wrong section, oh how we laughed, not Kevs fault; he had been given a bum steer.  Five minutes later we were pulling up in the right section and finding our pegs.

Settling down I decided to fish bread short, groundbait by the boats and a worm line down the river to my right, my groundbait was the first job and a mix of Gros Gardons, No.1, Lake and brown Crumb with a few special bits was soon ready for a rest. I then spent a bit of time plumbing up and found a few problematic bits of weed in the swim, but after 10 minutes I soon had 3 areas of the swim earmarked and finished my prep.

I was readyish for the all in apart even though I had been chatting to Craig for most of the time; we had already decided to go a quid when we found out that we were in the same section so I was surprised when he started giving me tactical gems. I repaid the favour, sit on the dry stuff and use a hook. I fed a small ball of licky bread at 2+2, then 3 balls of groundbait across to the boat, all quite hard as I wanted them to take a while to break down and reveal the goodies inside them. I went straight out on the bread line and started catching straight away. I was on a 0.6g float with a 0.08mm hooklength to a 20 B511, this was set on doubled 4 again and it was working a treat even letting me swing 4oz roach with ease but still remaining soft enough not to bump any off. It was 30 minutes in and Craig had his second bite on the worm that I had seen and I was swinging my 30^th fish to hand for close to 2lb. It was at this point that my day went wrong as I decided to feed my worm line, now this could have been an inspired decision and I could have had 20lb of skimmers or tench but I didn’t.

After feeding the worm line it was back on the bread fish but they had reduced in size drastically, a small nugget of bread and depth change sorted it for 3 more fish but then it started to turn into a grind. I tried on the worm line for a couple of small perch and across for a couple of roach before they backed off but it was head down time.

I rotated trough the swims taking as many fish as I dare from each one, a few eels started coming out on worm to my left and right so I swapped my hooklength to a 0.16mm bottom and a size 13 B711, this didn’t put the fish off, so is one to remember. I tried loose feeding over the groundbait line but the fish seemed to spook off to many loose offerings, so a small nugget of groundbait after every rotation was the plan.

The flow was tricky, it was going left to right, then it stopped and flowed the other way for 2 ½ hours before going back left to right for the last hour, odd. The fish preferred it going left to right. The wind and leaves on the water and bottom were also a pain but I was steadily amassing a weight.

The last 30 minutes saw a quick flurry of better roach and then it was all over, I was confident that I had done Craig but the guy to my left had been sneaking fish in all day from one line down the track, Craig had 6lb odd, I beat that with 9lb 4oz then the guy to my left had 10lb dead.  I ended up 7^th in section, Craig was12th and kev was last, I didn’t Hang around for the results as I had to do the 3 hour drive home.

What would I do different

Not a lot really I could say leave the worm in the car but if I had done that it would have been a worm day. Next time I will be stricter on myself for 100 seconds on the worm and if they are small I will come off it as they were taking longer to catch than the Gustas.

Jefferies Cup 2013

It was off to march for the annual Jefferies Cup competition, I was picked up by Chri Glover at 0330 and off we trundled, we made good time and even with a quick stop off to refuel we arrived in plenty of time. Plenty of banter was had at the draw venue and it was soon to business, Jon Hatch was B team captain for the day and he returned to Bri, Daz and myself peg 2, I got A section as I was car sharing with gloves so off we went.
Parking was simple, and we soon found our pegs, Gloves was on 12, which was in a far better area but we went a quid any way. It was made worst when the REF angler to my left who had helped to peg it in the morning and had been told that we were in the worst end of the section.

 On the whole the peg looked alright, but I had a small problem as I had only packed rigs for a proper river, the swim was 4 ft down the middle and my lightest rig was 0.75g, I set this and a 1.5g up in case it towed a bit, both Dino Premiers on 0.12mm main line and a 0.08mm bottom to a size 20 hook. I decided to fish ground bait down the middle so I mixed 3Kg of bait and then looked down the peg for a worm line next to the cabbages on the inside. This rig was 0.18-0.14  and a size 14 hook, under a 0.7g slim float. Finally I plumbed up across and tight to the boat, it was a little shallow so I pulled back half a section and put on a bread line with the same line and hooks as the ground bait line, but a smaller 0.6g float.
At the all in (that was 15 minutes earlier than I was expecting) I fed 3 balls of ground bait with squatt, pinkie and hemp in at 10M, then I potted a small ball of licky across with half a pot of hemp.  I went straight on to the ground bait line and started to catch straight away nothing massive but it was a fish a put in, I found that by chopping and changing hook baits as well as the depth I was able to string a few better fish together from time to time. About an hour in I fed the worm line with 4 lobs finely chopped through a bait dropper, and 10 minutes later I was pulling out 4 perch to 6 oz for nearly a pound in short order.
At about half one what flow there had been disappeared and I was left with rigs too heavy to really catch but by chopping and changing around all three swims and hook baits and depths I was able to keep fish going in the net. The afternoon was miserable with trashed rigs, rain and swans causing havoc so when the all out was called I was quite happy to finish.
To cut a long story short I had 6lb 15 1/2oz for 9th in section, I got beaten on both sides (by 1 1/2oz to my left) but I managed to get a quid off Gloves. Army A managed 4th but we were well down the running. Always next year.

Jefferies Cup, River Nene

This was my first visit to the Nene and I had been looking forward to it for a couple of weeks, rigs and hooklengths were tied ready and the rest of my kit was well prepped. I drew a peg about 3 pegs upstream of a small footbridge, an area that I was told would normally be run to by the guys fishing, ‘Normally?’ I replied, and soon found out why.

It was 13m wide and around 4 feet deep so perfect for a bit of bread fishing, especially since the river was so clear, I set up a 0.75g Drennan carbo on 0.12mm Cenex mainline and a 0.08mm bottom of the same material, with a 20 B511, all set on a top 4 rig with no.5 Cenex elastic through 3 sections. I also set up a strung styl hemp rig and a worm rig but enough about them as neither produced a bite. At the all in I fed a small ball of licky bread at 5m in front of me and 4 balls of groundbait at 11m downstream at 2 o’clock, before shipping out a 4mm punch onto my 5m line.
Basically nothing happened, I re-fed with ting nuggets of bread to try and attract the roach onto that line but it did not work, started a worm line but nothing on that and I had no indications on my groundbait line. The RAF angler to my right had caught about a dozen roach in the first 2 hours so I needed to catch something to save face and I got off my box and ‘adapted’ a hemp rig into a light bread rig. 0.10mm mainline, 0.07mm Cenex bottom with a 20 B511 all set on no.3 Cenex elastic. The float was a slim 0.2g pattern with a hollow bristle and I plumbed this up on a line under the tree in front of me at about 10m fed a tiny pinch of loose licky (as there was next to no flow) then went over the top with a 4mm punch. I had an almost instant response but missed my first couple of bites but a change to a 3mm punch sorted that out and I was soon putting skimmers into the net. Not bad I thought but the skimmers were around 20-25 to the pound with the odd slighty better roach thrown in for good measure, I found that you could not take too many fish from the line on the bounce as they would back off. I nurtured the swim as much as possible and at the end of the match I had done a good job of trying to catch up and thought I had possibly 2kg in the net, the scales however, told a different tale and the fish were alot smaller than I had thought (plus I did not count them) and I ended up with 2lb 6oz. This was enough for 5th in a 15peg section but I was not impressed with my first visit to the river, the section was won with a joint weight of 3lb 1.5oz so all I needed was another line perhaps that I could have caught on and it would have been enough.


Lessons learnt were to stick to my guns! I saw that the river was tap water clear and thought hat bread would be the way but still fed a groundbait line!! And, never give in as the last hour was the best as the light started to fade.