Ravely Drain, Round 6 Deeping Individual League

This Sunday saw the final round of the individual league fished on Ravely drain and it also included the second leg of the Newman Trophy which is an inter club match fished against yaxley.
After my win last week I was happy to be heading the league going into the final round although I still thought that it was going to be a tall order having not seen the venue for many years.
I started my match preparation by popping over to the venue midweek and having a look and a walk along the match length along with reading any recent match reports. One of these was written by Bob Nudd from a recent match where he came second with 549 fish, now this was ok but it left me with as many questions as it did answers so I emailed him to see what else I could learn. Now I wasn't sure I would even get a reply but towards the end of the week he sent me a reply giving me some useful info that left me feeling a little more confident in the plan I had put together.

A view looking towards the sluice

Individual League round 5

Well this weekend saw a long awaited return to action after the last 2 weeks had been wiped out by the weather and the matches cancelled. This week was the re arranged Several Fisheries Trophy match,  it also incorporated round 5 of the individual league and was to be fished on the clubs section of the river Welland through Deeping St James. There were 14 anglers at the draw and the venue had been pegged to try and put everyone on fish as the river was low, Gin clear and lacking any real flow with certain areas completely devoid of any fish. I had however visited the river on the Friday afternoon to have a couple of hours and I had managed 2 1/2lb of fish from a swim 2' 6" deep and as clear as tap water so I was reasonably hopeful. 

High Locks at Deeping St James

Stretton Lakes, Round 4 Deeping Individual League

Due to the fact that most of our local river venues are very poor at the moment the decision was made to switch round 4 of the individual league to a commercial fishery. I for one was not looking forward to this at all as I don't really fish this type of venue very often and had never even seen the chosen venue before. Anyway Stretton Lakes it was then and after a quick look on the internet and asking a few local anglers I was still none the wiser and so I resigned myself to going in blind.

In the week before the match I made myself up a few rigs to cover both Carp and Silver fish, I also sorted out a couple of power kits with suitable elastic in the shape of a No9 hollow and a No12 solid for Carp and for the silver fish I would use a match kit and a No 6 elastic. Bait wise I planned to use Maggot, Casters, Pellets and a little groundbait with a few Pinkies in it but as for a plan I thought I would make it up when I arrived at my peg.

Match day arrived and after the 35 minute drive from my home in Peterborough  I arrived at the venue to find quite a few anglers had braved the cold, 16 in all so not a bad show at all. The weather was overcast and 3 degrees centigrade with hardly any breeze on the water but there were small fish topping all over the lake which by the way was a long strip with islands all down the middle at around 13m. The club had done the sensible thing and missed out every other peg so everybody had a full island feature to fish to. After the normal pre match banter that we all know and love it was time for the draw although at this point I couldn't really see any advantage in any peg as they were all very similar. I drew peg 11 which was mid point along the bank and suited me fine as it was right behind the parking area.


Peg 11 showing the 4 lines I fished