I drew peg 11 which had been a good area in recent mid-week matches apparently.
Athough the weather had turned a bit milder after the beasts from the east 1 and 2, the water was still very cold.
I decided to fish at 13m with groundbait and loose feed maggots at 6m.
At the start of the match I fed a ball of dark groundbait with a few micro pellets and some pinkies mixed in and a cup of loose groundbait on 11m in front and some pellets at 11m to the right side of my peg.
Starting at 6m with a strung out shotting pattern and a light rig I caught a few roach but it was slow going. After an hour I had a look at 11m and caught odd roach and the occasional small skimmer but very tough going, half way through the match I only had a couple pounds of fish.
At approx 1pm I had my first decent skimmer, up to now I had been trying variations of maggot hookbaits but when no more bites came for several minutes I tried the pellet line with an expander on the hook which only produced a small roach and a very small skimmer, I then tried the same rig/bait over the groundbait line and this soon produced a slightly better sized skimmer.
I then switched back to the lighter rig but with expander for bait which proved a good decision as I during the remainder of the match I had a few big skimmers, a couple of F1s and in the last 30 minutes 2 carp all on this set up.
My total for the day was 18lb 14oz which was enough to win.
The club report and full results can be seen HERE.