Ben Fisk Angling: The Parkdean Masters Final 2013, Jennys Lake

After presentation night and a quick cider, I was up until 1.30am Saturday morning sorting my gear out for the final and tying new rigs and hooklengths. With £25,000 at stake no chances could be taken and I didn’t want a lack of preparation to potentially cost me. The Parkdean Masters is different to the other big money finals such as Fish O and Match This in that you don’t have months to prepare and practise. A lot of the time it comes down to who does it best on the day, especially with the match only being four hours long.

It was a bit of a rush to pack all my gear and bags and vacate the lodge in time for the 9am meet but it was done and Lee, Andy and myself found ourselves nervously waiting for the draw to commence. When it did, I managed to pull peg 8 out for myself. My first thought was one of disappointment that I had not found 15 or 16 where the proper carp live but I soon realised I was in a very good area for F1s. I decided to get my head down and fish for them using Lindholme methods and ignore proper carp altogether, even though I knew a lot of other anglers would be fishing worms to try and catch them.

Peg 8 is in the middle of a gap with a gravel bar in the middle. My opening gambit was onto this bar with a method feeder but it was very slow, not just for me but for everyone in our arm of the lake. Martin Holmes, Cameron Hughes, Des Shipp, Nick Speed, Neil Mckinnon, Andy Power and James Dent were all to my left and not much was being caught. A quick change to pellets saw three quick fish but then that seemed to be after another two casts. Already I was thinking that we were all drawn in the wrong area of the lake here and the other side would dominate the match.

I decided to go onto my shallow line after about half an hour and immediately I caught an F1. Was it a one off? Next cast I got another, then another, but it wasn’t easy. The wind was howling into my face, making it difficult to get bait out there, and presentation wasn’t great. I just tried to get my head down, be as smooth and quick as possible, and come back with a fish every cast. I had a good two hours shallow but word came down that Andy Leathers already had 60lb on peg 16. I was really pleased for him and I just carried on catching, my immediate thought was to try and win the pound side bet or ‘mini section’ I had with Martin to my left and Steve Conway and Harry Billing to the right, which I seemed to be doing with ease as they weren’t catching much.

As the match went on I realised I might be on for a weight and I really pushed myself to go as fast as I could but it wasn’t easy after so little sleep and five days of continuous high pressure fishing before that! I suffered a very bad spell in the third hour, I was still catching but it was taking a long time for a bite to materialise. I didn’t want to change methods in case I risked losing them so I stuck with what I was doing and hoped the fish would return properly. In the last hour they did much to my relief and one of the spectators watching on the opposite side told me that I caught 19 F1s in the last half hour alone.

I wasn’t really sure what I’d got but the word on the bank was that Andy Leathers had won it. I duly weighed in 97lb 15oz, more than I thought but Andy had well over 100lb people were telling me.
I didn’t pay too much attention to his weigh in until he pulled his second net out and deep down I somehow just knew I’d been beaten. I wasn’t quite prepared to be beaten by just 5oz though. Although I wasn’t actually very gutted at the time as seeing my friend Andy take all the plaudits and go up for his trophy, cheque and traditional dip in the lake really gave me a buzz. He’s a top guy and he deserved it. It was the days after that what had happened really began to hit home. What if I’d gone shallow earlier? What if I’d not lost that fish? I can recall losing just one fish on the way in and one at the net, out of 90+ f1s, and in all honesty Andy lost a couple of fish too. I really felt I gave it everything I had but sometimes something just hasn’t got your name on it. Once again I remembered losing the Kamasan British Open in 2009 by just 3lb at Moorlands Farm, losing a couple of fish that day too. Now I know how Grant Albutt feels – hopefully one of these days I might just win something! This result put me down for a few days but I was soon back fishing and I am really determined to get back in the Masters final next year to put this result right.