The Young Guns

In my role as assistant to John Horsey in the Peregrine/Nomad International Flyfishing Competition I was unfortunately out of the country for the first round event at Rutland, but I had a full report from John. There were no great surprises as Dave Shipman’s Cormorant Fly Fishers team easily won the day with 37 trout. Local teams filled the next two spots too: Rutland Kingfishers in second and Rutland Water FF just under two pounds behind in third place, exactly equal on weight and number as Team Terminal Tackle. I look forward to seeing those teams in the final in August.At Llanderfedd, on a bitterly cold May day, we had a real surprise as the very last two teams to weigh in filled the two qualifying spots. In second place were Neath and Swansea, but the junior team – The Young Guns – surprised all the seasoned anglers by winning the day. They were over 7 pounds clear and, amazingly, each of the four young lads managed to catch one of the reservoir’s large stockies. The fishing was tough, though for the first thirty to forty minutes you would not have thought so, as rod after rod bent into trout.Last weekend saw the long pilgrimage to Kielder Water in Northumbria. In first place were the favourites Ospreys A team, but they relied heavily on the amazing performance of Stephen Peart who took individual honours with eleven trout. Stephen’s bag alone beat ten of the teams fishing! In second place were Team Quali-Tye, followed on their route to Rutland by Eaglesham FF. Only ounces decided this competition – it sure is tough to fail in going any further when you know that you have lost a fish or two!There have been several rounds of the Hardy Competition. As a member of the Bristol Reservoirs FFA I actually fished a heat of this event at Wimbleball and managed to help my team through to the English final at Rutland in July. We came second to Kingfishers and Innis came through in third position. There were no surprises on the other two days. Bath won through, as did the Grenadiers, Blagdon(two teams), Newent and Kingfishers “B”.The new competition this season is the one run by Airlo. It has experienced some teething problems, nevertheless it has launched with heats at Llandegfedd and Llys-Y-Ffran. I have not been able to track down details of the qualifying teams as yet, but I will ensure that I have them by next week.In many parts of the country qualification for the England team has begun in earnest. Here in the South West for the first time (and long overdue), all prospective England fishermen have to fish the same event. Until this season some local anglers took the “easier” option of fishing the Southern Region heats at Chew. These were arranged over several weekends – occasionally with as few anglers as five taking part! One or two of the better local anglers would pick and choose the heat that they fished to ensure that they had a somewhat easier path through to the national final. Thankfully that is no longer an option. Our first qualifier was fished before the Worlds and all of those who qualified for our final eliminator had to catch a limit of fish – though even that didn’t guarantee them a spot, as two lads had eight fish but did not get through! As a complete contrast, I fished in the second of the eliminators. In this event 16 of the field were to progress. On a really tough day only 18 anglers actually caught trout! I was fortunate enough to be one of the lucky ones – my 3lb 1oz qualifying me in 9th spot. There were a couple of bags of four trout, and some threes, but considering how well the lake had been fishing it was a very poor day. Some rather “big” names failed to go through: last year’s National champion Tony Baldwin failed to catch a trout; Geoff Lambert and Biker Humphry also had the dreaded blank. In the earlier heat Lee Sennington also missed the cut. We fish our final eliminator on 28th June with about ten anglers to go through to this year’s National.On the club scene, one of the clubs that I am an active member of – Blagdon FF, started a trend at the weekend that I hope will catch on. In its competition it was decided to give “Catch and release” a trial. This was put into practice once six fish had been caught and killed (bear in mind that the limit on Chew is eight fish). I was unable to fish the match as I was travelling back from Kielder but I went to the weigh-in and I can assure you that competitors thought well of the idea. John Braithwaite came out as the top angler with six trout, six returned, and time bonus added on. He amassed 29pounds. The award for clubman of the year was presented at the buffet afterwards. It was good to see John Mitchell – long of Normark and one of the club’s most loyal sponsors over the years, win this most prestigious award.This weekend we had our “Orvis” sponsored competition (this time in my BRFFA hat), whilst on Sunday John and I journey down to Bewl for the fourth round of the Peregrine/Nomad. Thursday, Friday and Saturday this week see the same competition fished at Chew. Full reports on these events next week.Tight lines for now!

Martin Cottis