Run of success following Korda Carp Academy
I was lucky enough to get accepted on Korda Carp Academy back in 2017. The event was held on a new Embryo water in Essex and I spent the couple of days there with Team Korda’s Rob Burgess. The fishing was very tough during that event, and like many of the students, I failed to catch anything. To fish with an angler with such high calibre as Rob, was amazing and I took loads away from this including fishing effectively and efficiently, maximising bites and opportunities. I learnt an awful lot and was able to put it to good use on my local club waters shortly afterwards.
My first session back on a local water after the Academy produced four fish up to 31lb, which was only my third ever thirty, and I also had a successful trip to France when I landed fish to 35lb, along with a 32lb grass carp.
I then started a campaign on a club water that was fairly new to me, and after arriving at 7am I was drawn to the far end of the lake as that is where the wind was blowing, and I knew that they tended to follow it on this venue. Sure enough, just as I stepped into the swim a fish launched itself out of the water by the set of reeds in front of the peg, which was enough to make me set up here and go about getting my rods out.
I set one of my rods up with a blow-back rig which I tied using a size 4 Kurv Shank hook to a 15lb N-Trap Semi-Stiff hook link, and this was fished with three-quarters of a 15mm boilie, tipped with half of a 14mm Karper Peach Amino pop-up. I cast this to the reeds and managed to land about 6ft from them in a good depth of water, and got a firm landing when the lead went down. I was happy and tied on a small piece of Marker Elastic so that I could get it back there with the minimum disturbance when I re-cast.
I decided to use my second rod as a rover which I would cast to any showing fish, and I opted for a bright Ultra-Fluro Chocmint pop-up on a soft hinge rig, constructed from a size 6 Choddy to 25lb Mouthtrap, and a boom section made of 20lb N-Trap Soft. By using the soft braid on the boom section it meant that I had full confidence that this was going to be fishing over debris, when casting to showing fish.
Throughout the session I kept baiting the rod by the reeds with a few boilies to keep the carp grubbing around, and I also kept re-casting the roving rod every time I saw a fish show. I ended up landing seven fish, with roughly equal amounts on each rod, and was over-the-moon with the result, as whilst I was there only one other carp was caught. My fish weighed 26lb 2oz, 23lb 6oz, 22lb 6oz, 21lb 8oz, 20lb, 17lb and a 12lb 8oz common.
I was keen to do another session and decided on a quick overnighter after college, and this time I set up in a swim that gave me access to a snaggy margin which I fished both of my rods against.
Nothing happened during the night and I was planning to leave at 4pm to beat the traffic home, but as I pushed my gear back to the car park I saw multiple shows in front of a swim on the other side of the lake. I decided that the opportunity was too good to be missed and pushed my gear round to that area and set up for the night.
I cast out supple hinge rigs to where the fish were showing, and no sooner had I got the rest of my gear sorted out when one of the rods was away. After a short battle I had the powerful fish in the net and knew that it was a decent one, but it wasn’t until I hoisted it up on the scales that I realised just how big it was, as they settled on 30lb. I was really chuffed as it was my first thirty from this water, and the next morning I added another of 15lb before I went home.
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