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Question from Mike Shaw
Hi,
Firstly, the SFCA fishing website is the best fishing website I have seen so far in five years of 'surfing' - well done.
Secondly, I started match fishing last year in the Carlisle and District Coarse Angling Club (
www.english5.freeserve.co.uk) winter league - fished on Loch Ken (fantastic venue - beaten by Ewan Weed on the next peg!), River Eden, etc and finished fourth overall, which was pleasing.Finally a question, say that the Scottish team is heading for the europeans or world champs and it is a carp bagging venue, given the lack of carp bagging waters in Scotland how do you go about practising for this type of event? Do you fly out a month in advance and practise - if so, how do you afford it? or does the team travel to english waters (Woodlands, etc) and practise? or, are there carp bagging waters in Scotland that I don't know about?
Many thanks,
Mike.
Davie's Answer
Hi Mike,
Firstly, it may surprise you to know that very few European or World Championships are Carp bagging events, in fact only one in recent years. In many of these events Carp are present but often they are bonus fish and rarely targeted exclusively. The most notable exception however was Spain 1999 where anglers were catching up to 30 kilos a man in 3 hours in practice and competition.
You are quite right to point out that Scotland has a distinct lack of Carp sport and this has been a problem for the international team recently. When we learned that big Carp catches we were likely in Spain, we decided to plan a couple trips to learn as much about the species as possible before the event. We had two weekend sessions, one on Mallory Park and the other on the match venue itself in Spain, before flying for a weeks practice before the event in early September. These proved really useful as we learned lots about how Carp feed/behave and became accustomed to playing (and landing) bigger fish. We also learned about our tackle limitations and got to grips with what our likely requirements would be after some smashed sections and lost fish.
Come the official practice week we really began to see the benefits of these earlier practices as they had given us a confidence in our tackle and in ourselves. We were then able to focus on learning about how the venue would fish come match day and set about formulating our plan of attack.
Something else we lack in Scotland is finance. Most of the cash required for such events comes from the anglers themselves so our practice and competitions tend to take place here in Scotland and the rest of the UK. However, during 1999 we were lucky enough to receive a contribution from the Lottery Sports Fund that enabled us to fish the venue in advance of the Championships. Many international teams nowadays are almost fully professional with expenses and practices being paid for by major sponsors (e.g. England or France) but the sport is more developed in these countries than in Scotland. Who knows…maybe one day!
Finally, thanks for the question, I hope I’ve answered it to your satisfaction. Good luck with your matches this season and tight lines.
Davie
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