Mike palmer trophy 🏆

‘The results are in’ as they say in Strictly Come Dancing ! Five adventurous characters turned out in less than ideal weather to participate in this match, to remember the sad loss of Mike (Gentleman) Palmer, one of our greatly respected past members who sadly passed away in the summer of 2018.This event developed into a more and more memorable day as each hour passed. We all arrived outside of the Lilies venue by 8:45 am in good time for Steve to get us through the electronically controlled main gate. As we drove on to the site, heavy rain came down just in time to give Steve a good soaking as he waved his pass at the newly installed internal site barrier. Then disaster, the barrier did not raise so blocking our route to the lake, a quick phone call revealed that the site security team had not added Steve’s pass to the list of authorised users!, the rain continued to hammer down. Eventually after 15 minutes of waiting, a site worker turned up to collect materials, his pass successfully opened the barrier and at last we were in. The delay to gain access led to us starting the match 15 minutes late, after the draw for pegs, Pete, Julie, Steve and Mick decided to fish West Lake whilst Mike went for East Lake in the hope of not taking yet another Lilies blank. At 10:15 am, Mike blew the start whistle over West Lake, this was not part of a deliberate strategy to signal the West Lake Carp that it’s time to stop feeding and go hide (honest!). At this point the rain stopped and stayed off for the whole match. The match got going and immediately Mike was catching Rudd from the first cast, they seemed to be queuing up to feed on the sweetcorn offerings. As the match progressed, Mick also found the Rudd this time on West Lake, but no action for the others on West Lake. Mike continued to regularly pull in Rudd from East Lake until midday when the Tench arrived, then back on West Lake Mick had a tough battle with a powerful 14 lb 5 ozs Common Carp that deliberately swam around the lily stems in an effort to escape, but Mick valiantly held on to eventually land a beautiful and immaculate fish. Meanwhile Mike had an East Lake surprise in the form of a 4 ozs Dace, a good size for this species that normally lives in the fast flowing stretches of rivers, this was the first one caught by Mike since the 1970s. By match end, the total number of fish caught on the day was high:Mick: 1 Common and 2 Rudd.Mike: 6 Tench, 41 Rudd and 1 Dace.Sadly the others blanked. To round off the day, Sue and Paddy (the dog) dropped in for a visit in time for Mike to blow the closing whistle at which point the skies darkened and torrential rain came down accompanied by several flashes of lightning and loud thunderclaps … what a day. Match Winner: Mike Waite with 16 lbs 6 ozs total weight.Biggest Fish: Mick Phillips with a 14 lbs 5 ozs Common Carp.Biggest surprise of the day was that Dace, no one knew there were any in either of the lakes.Mike WaiteMatch Organiser, Horizon Angling Club for the disabledTel: (01243) 771373Mob: 07581062628Sent from my Galaxy