Weds open plantation main lake

19 booked in for today which was a suprise at it was pole only match and we were due to have 30 mph winds for most of the day, and we didn't get disappointed, the weather men seem to get it right more times than wrong these days. I let andy France draw for me which was a worry as he normally gives me rubbish pegs, I fancied a peg on the far side as the wind would be off  my back ,but it wasn't to be as he handed peg 19 which is on a spit at the far end of the lake ,and its the closest peg to the main island. The wind was gusting from my left and slightly over my shoulder whereas all the swims on the bank to my left had flat water and no wind due to the trees giving them shelter, whereas the pegs between 1 and 12 had it full on in there faces .
I made up a couple of 4x14 rigs ,one for caster and maggot over groundbait at 10 mtrs and the other for soft pellet or maggot over micros at 13 mtrs slightly off to my right slightly with the wind, any further than that and I think I may Have broken something, the caster rig had the normal 18 middy 6313 on .10 whereas the soft pellet rig had a middy 8313 size20 on .12. I. Also set up a 4x12 rig for my left hand margin but I only missed one bite down there on maggot so I think it was a small fish,
At the start I cupped in 3 balls of groundbait on the 10 mtr line with a few casters in it and some soaked micros at 13 mtrs.
Starting with single caster over the g bait it didn't take long to get a bite from a roach , then for the next 2 hours I caught steadily with the peg really coming alive after about 45 mins and I was catching skimmers really well, with double caster accounting for a few good skimmers up to 3 lb then as soon as they arrived they were gone, never to return, I did get a couple on maggot over the micro line but the rest of the match was a bit of a struggle, I could catch small roach on caster over the g bait but I had to wait till the last hour for any carp action and then I had 2 smallish ones on maggot, the pace setters for today seemed to be mat tomes on 27 and john(turkey) Thompson on 28 which was the best pegs last time we had a match on here, also andy France on peg1 seemed to be catching a few, and going into the last hour Aaron britnell on 32 began to catch well, andy curry to my right no 18 had 7 carp plus a few skimmers but his carp were on the small side so he would be out of the reckoning,
At the end mat tomes thought he had done enough but he hadn't banked on turkey having caught on paste(aargh) and his fish were of a better stamp, and that's how it turned out with John Thompson,s paste caught fish going 66.4 off peg 28
2nd was andy France on peg 1 with 59.1
3rd mat tomes on 27 with 58.7
4th Aaron britnell with 53.10 on peg 32
5th Anton page 44.10 peg 38
6th andy curry on peg 18 with 35.7
Silver went to me with 26.12 of mainly skimmers , my 2 carp went 7.8 for a total weight of  34.4
All in all a nice close match