West Cork and District SAC fished a sandeel only competition at Youghal Beach on Sunday…
On Sunday evening we held our Bait Supplies Competition (Sandeels Only), and it was a fantastic turnout with 33 anglers entered into the match. We run all of our competitions through pre-entry, and do the peg draw the evening before the match — this works very well for us and frees up the organisers on match day.
Each angler received 30 sandeels for this competition, and it was up to each angler how to manage their bait for the duration of the 4-hour match. A good few big names from the Irish match scene, with a fine collection of world medals to their names, had entered this one — so it was always going to be interesting to see who came out on top.
Competition time was from 4:30pm to 8:30pm, and a nice coloured sea was definitely going to help the fishing. Fish showed up from the first cast, but it wasn’t until about two hours into the match that the leading pack pulled away from the rest. There were five or six lads in the mix — Richie Gormley, Derek Kenrick, Pat Maher, JP Molloy, and Ciaran Fogarty — all with very little separating them at the halfway stage.
Going into the second half of the competition, Pete Davis put himself in the mix by landing a few dogfish and a bullhuss, but going into the last hour, big hitters Ciaran and Derek had very little separating them.
Neither of the two knew who had it until the cards were added up. However, the long journey for Ciaran was worthwhile as he took the win.
Ciaran’s winning card consisted of 10 dogfish and a single whiting for 522pts. Derek finished with 491pts, his card made up of a mix of whiting, dogfish, flounder, and a bullhuss. Pat Maher took third place with 445pts — well done lads
Onto the pools — half of the entry fee in a WCAD match goes towards the pools. We find this an excellent system that gives anglers of all levels and abilities a chance of winning one of the best prizes of the competition.
Dave Keating, no stranger to winning the pools, took the Flatfish Pool with a lovely flounder of 33cm, worth €165 on the night — well done Dave
Surprisingly, no Ray showed up at this competition.
The big talking point of the evening was the fish that won the Round Fish Pool — Steve Watkins landed a lump of a bass measuring 66cm, an absolute cracker and well deserving of the €165 prize.
Eight different species of fish were recorded on the night — not a bad showing at all for one type of bait!
Species caught were LSD, Bullhuss, Whiting, Flounder, Pouting, Poor Cod, Coalfish, and Bass.
Overall, the competition ran very smoothly for us, and we’d like to thank everyone who travelled to fish it. Hopefully, we’ll get some positive feedback and look at running another Bait Supplies Competition next year.
Finally, a big thanks to the WCAD members who were involved in running this — ye know who ye are!
Go fishing…
All about West Cork and District SAC…
The club was formed on march 19th 2009, in the small picturesque harbour town of Kinsale County Cork. We’re an inclusive club, this can be seen in our membership profile; from anglers who are new to match fishing all the way up to members of the Irish World Shore Team 2010, two of which are in the club! The club holds circa 10 competitions per year, members are encouraged to practice a catch and release policy in the interests of conservation. Anybody wishing to join our club is always welcome, just use the contact us page and we will give prospective members full details.
Web: http://westcorkanddistrict.webs.com/
Facebook: facebook.com/pages/West-Cork-and-District-SAC/
