Kev Hewitt’s excellent spring continued, this time he’s back on the match circuit with first place in a UK Carp Cup qualifier at Acorn Fishery in North Somerset. Here’s Kev’s match report:
It is that time of year again when competitions start coming thick and fast for me and there is none that I look forward to more than the UK Carp Cup qualifier on Acorn fishery in North Somerset. I grew up just two miles away from the lake and was there to watch my good friends the Bartlett’s dig the venue from scratch in the 90’s as I was first learning my trade as a carp angler. Now over 10 years down the line I find myself fishing Carp cup qualifiers on the lake, in fact this is the third year running that I have fished the event on the venue. The previous two years I had managed a first and a second so there was added pressure this year to keep up the good form. Not only that but with it being so close to where I grew up and where my family still live, my parents always come down to sit with me for large parts of the match. In fact that is probably why I look forward to this match more than any other event throughout the year as it is probably the most time I get to spend with my parents and it just feels like home.
The anticipation of the draw is always a killer for me and no matter how many matches I fish, the draw is the only time I actually feel any nerves. This year I needed a half decent draw and I felt that there were only five pegs out of the 11 in the match that actually stood a chance of qualifying. As the names filtered out of the hat, my name still hadn’t been called but luckily when it did get called, there was one peg left out of the five where I felt confident of qualifying. I am not the best at drawing. The draws are based on a watercraft basis where by a competitors name get picked out of a hat and they get to pick their first choice of pegs. In my previous 6 qualifiers I had managed a bottom three draw in all but one. Despite this I had managed a top two fish in all of the previous six qualifiers in the UK Carp Cup and BCAC.
The match kicked off at 6pm and I started with the same tactics which saw me come good in the previous two years. The method feeder to the island and solid pva bags fished in open water. Acorn has a good head of fish and really I expected to get onto the score sheet fairly early but no bites materialised during the evening. There was one fish caught further round the lake and I entered into darkness biteless. Now I have never spodded on the lake before, the fish have always responded well to the method feeder and solid bag approach that I have adopted for a number of years but now we were about four hours into the match and I just knew that I had to try something a little different. I decided to put a baited area ¾ of the way to the island at 35 yards range and fish a mini ESP solid PVA bag of oily bag mix with a Hellraiser mini bites pop up tipped with a mini ESP grain of plastic corn. With the mini bites being unflavoured, I pre soaked them in my favourite silent assassin hellraiser booster liquid.
And 1.30am I received my first take and it was the bait rod that had ripped off. It was my first fish off a spodded area from the venue in all the years that I had fished it. Into the net she went, all 8Lb of here. Straight away I recast both rods over the bait both with the same presentation only I like to fish different combinations of colours of hookbaits one each rod just to keep the carp guessing. This is why the Hellraiser mini bitez are ideal as they come in five different colours and with them being 8mm in size, tipped with a mini grain of plastic corn they offer a perfectly balanced hookbait.
It was 4am when I received my next take and this time a slightly bigger fish registered nicely on the score board. I topped up with a further five spomb fulls of bait and only had to wait a further two hours for my next bite and this time it was obvious from the off I was into something a bit better. The angry carp gave a good scrap and as I netted her I thought it was a low twenty. I quickly unhooked the fish in the net, got the rod out followed by another five spombs of bait and called the marshal to do the weighing rituals. When I hoisted the net onto the unhooking mat the fish felt a little bit bigger than I first thought and the scales confirmed that at 26Lb, it was the biggest common in the lake known as Bonno, all be it well down in weight. Nether the less she looked stunning in the early morning sunshine which was in the process of burning off the mist that drifted across the tranquil looking lake. My total weight now stood at around 45Lb with second place on 22Lb.
The sun warmed up as the day progressed and I tried everything from zigs to fishing in the edge to get a bite but nothing occurred till later in the afternoon when the rod on the bait melted off with a low double mirror. A quick top up of bait and my next take came in the shape of a lovely 18Lb mirror. Every fish was extending my lead and with very little else caught across the lake it was looking ever increasingly like I was going to secure a qualifying position for the third year running. My parents came down during the afternoon with some much deserved fresh prawn sandwiches and sat behind the swim chatting to Clint whilst being entertained by the baby peacocks.
The fish were definitely up for a bit of grub so I gave it to them in the evening and fish both rods over the bait for the remainder of the match, topping up in between every bite. I landed a further five fish from seven takes during the night and ended the match at 10am with a winning weight of 139Lb 13oz, a full 106Lb ahead of Steve Stefanou in second place who qualified with two fish for 33Lb 9oz. Well done to Steve who pulled it out of the bag to secure the second qualifying position and I look forward to seeing you in the semi finals on Brasenose one in July!
