I mentioned in my last blog that I had qualified for the final of the Fish To Win competition, which was held recently at Lake John Fishery at Waltham Abbey in Essex. I'm glad to report I caught a few fish and won £500, thanks to a trick I learnt using Sonubaits' 6mm Fin Perfect feed pellets!

There are lots of big carp in the lake, and by big I mean from 3lb to 30lb-plussers. The rules are that if you catch a thirty pounder in a match, you are only given 10lb towards your overall weight, and I mention this just as background information.
There are also skimmers and some bigger bream which are the predominant species and the lake has an average depth of around five foot.
The final was a 20-peg affair with £5,000 going to the winner and £500 for runner-up.
I managed to grab second spot and here I’m going to go through what I did and how I arrived at the method that got me some coin.
I’d been up to the lake on the two Wednesdays prior to the final and I had had 36lb and 31lb without troubling the brown envelope department.
And, to be frank, I hadn’t learnt a lot, either, on those forays, although it was noticeable that some people were fishing the waggler with pellet on the hook and loosefeeding pellets. They were catching some better fish.
I decided to have a little fish the day before the final to try the waggler method out and I had caught around 10 fish, firing out 6mm feed pellets. The biggest bream were nudging the 2lb mark but I wasn’t breaking any pots.
However, I did have a feeling there were quite a few fish there, so I decided to set up my 10 ft Preston Mini Carp rod and tie on a two-foot-long tail, to which I attached a hair-rigged PR36 size 8 hook, with a mini band.
Into the band went a 6mm pellet and out went the rig.
The transformation was instant and before long I’d caught 80lb of bream in two hours. In a nutshell, the fish wanted a still bait, though some of the bream were taking the hook-bait on the drop. I couldn’t believe what I’d found out and I couldn’t wait for the final.
And in the final I weighed 52lb to take second spot, fishing the same way with a bomb, a two-foot tail, and a 6mm feed pellet hair-rigged in a band.
The winner had 72lb, including three 10lb-plus carp, and third place was a 49lb weight.
The lads either side of me, Dave Vincent and Chris Nicholls, who polefished it, weighed 12lb and 14lb respectively, so it shows that the fish just wanted to be further out beyond pole range, and they wanted a static bait.
Next time you fancy a bream session, why not try this approach. And to make sure the pellets will catapult out 25 metres or so, why not do what I do with my Sonu 6mm Fin Perfect Feed Pellets and soak them for a minute or so, then drain off. It just ads that tiny bit of weight and softens them a touch.
Good luck!