Sunday 30th September - Sensas Bristol Commercial House League Round 2, Bristol Avon, Swineford to Chequers

I didn't fish the first round of the league at the beginning of Sept due to being away celebrating our 40th Wedding Anniversary. I know.....2 life sentences for murder.

40 years ago.... haven't changed much !

Nomads have 2 teams in the league this year, its a bit of a stretch with a lot of other things going on but we will see how it goes and its important to keep the league going although in a few years time we will all be on zimmers.

My old Maver Team make up the most of the 6 anglers in Sensas Nomads Black and we are in A Div. The mainly Wiltshire arm of the squad are Sensas Nomads Green and are in B Div. 4 Teams in each Div.
A poor first round on the KSD saw us lying 4th (bottom) in A Div so we were out to try and recover some ground. It is a tough Div with Thatchers and 2 Bathampton Teams who know the venues very well and have a good range of anglers to call on.

Our Team was...
Chris Hook (c)
Sam Johnson
Leigh Wakefield
Rich Whitmarsh
Geraint Powell
Me

Pegging today was as follows and a bit different to previous years with the introduction of Chequers were you could drive to your peg. Swineford and Jack Whites were reasonable walks with the Crane being a bit of a bas%*$d.

So.... as the oldest in the Team guess where I drew.... yep up the Crane C3 !!!!

I had trouble parking down by the Marina, its getting busier around this area due to the number of boat owners cars and had to do a circle in order to find a space.

A long walk with all the gear and 2 fences later (helped by other guys over the kissing gates, much appreciated) I arrive at my peg and took off the hoody to cool down.

The peg to be fair looked OK but you had to be careful due to overhanging branches.

Andy Britt was on the peg by the fence below me and then quite a bit upstream were the other 2 pegs.

The flow seemed OK at 13 meters, quite good to be honest so I set up a 3 gram and a 2 gram were it was top 4 deep (both rigs had 18's to 0.10 fluro) and a 1 gram rig for down the inside geared up for fishing chopped worm. A Feeder was set up but only used for about 15 mins the whole match. Ground bait was Sensas Dark River, Gros Gardons and Soil.

Fishing today was 10:00 - 15:00 and I was just about ready.

I only put in 4 balls at the start at 13 metres as there are a lot of pike up this end and was planning just to top up as I went.

A good helping of chopped worm went in down the inside in order to try and catch a bonus fish later.

It was quite a nice day with white cloud overhead and a very slight breeze upstream. First run down with the 3 gram and the float buried after a few seconds, nice plump roach of around 4 ozs.  During the first hour it was almost a fish a chuck but as time went on the light became more difficult with the reflection of the white boat on the water and I started bumping fish due o late strikes and not seeing the bite properly. I blackened the tip but didn't make much difference. 

After about 2 hours plus Andy came up to see how I was doing, I said about 5lbs and he said he had the same but it was switching off a bit. 

I started to get a bit of pike trouble so had a look on the inside. One small perch that was it after 15 minutes so went back out long. The upstream breeze increase and the float just sat there at times not moving very much at all. Put out the lighter rig which helped but it definitely slowed. I did top up with the odd ball and plenty of loose feed over the top which gave me a few more fish. 

The inside did not produce anything else and I only had a perch on the tip across.

At the end of the match I thought I had about 8lbs. Andy also said he had about the same. I know the peg was worth more than that and could have down double figures if the light had been better. A running line rig may also have helped but restricted due to the bushes and trees.

I was not far out with my estimate, 7 lbs 11oz.

Heres how the whole Section finished, quite tight.

Generally the river fished very well with loads of roach coming out. Sam got his Section by default and only just out of the money with 16lb plus. Leigh was equal 1st in his Section so 2 pick ups for the Team. We also done enough to get off the bottom so are making progress but there is a big gap to climb.

Here are the full results courtesy of Vince Lunn.....

Individuals
1 L Warden M & N Electrical 21 lbs 10 ozs
2 G Bailey Stand & Deliver Promotions 18 lbs 3 ozs
3 T Gilbert Preston Innovations Thatchers 17 lbs 12 ozs
4 N Johns Mosella Bathampton A 16 lbs 14 ozs
5 S Johnson Sensas Nomads Black 16 lbs 13 ozs
6 P Elmes Mosella Bathampton B 13 lbs 8 ozs

Teams
A Div on day
1 Preston Innovations Thatchers 20
2 Mosella Bathampton A 18.5
3 Sensas Nomads Black 12.5
4 Mosella Bathampton B 9 

B Div on day
1 DW Builders 17
2 Stand & Deliver Promotions 16
3 M & N Electrical 15
4 Sensas Nomads Green 11 

A Div League overall
1 Preston Innovations Thatchers 38
2 Mosella Bathampton A 35.5
3 Sensas Nomads Black 24.5
4 Mosella Bathampton B 22 

B Div League overall
1 Stand & Deliver Promotions 33
2 DW Builders 31
3 Sensas Nomads Green 27
4 M & N Electrical 27

We also picked up our prizes for winning B Div last year plus Glenn Calverts match winners prize.

Next up is the Upper Thames Winter League on the 7th at Lechlade.