Full report on the Pallatrax carp open held at Tamar Upper Lake. Thanks to Ben Smeeth for the write up.

Tamar New Boys win £2000 at Pallatrax Carp Open!
24 pairs of anglers took part in the second competition of the year with defending champs Phil and Sam Gilhespy looking to continue their very good record having won the competition twice in four attempts. Leading up to the competition Upper Tamar had sprung into life producing lots of fish up to 25lbs – hopefully this was a sign of good things for the weekend ahead!
During the water craft draw all anglers received a free Pallatrax goody bag with a range of their products and a complimentary 24 hour session on Lower Tamar. With the draw completed anglers were transported to their swims, an hour of baiting, marker rodding, spodding and spombing followed with the official start of the competition at 4pm.
Conditions seemed really favorable when it began and there were good prospects of catching lots of fish all around the lake. Friday evening came and went with odd fish caught in different areas of the lake but nothing consistent for any pair. Saturday was much the same with high winds and heavy showers not improving the catch rates. This did keep all the competitors really close together and all in with a chance of the £3500 prize money! The lake went flat calm on Sunday morning with a lot of carp seen cruising, and a lot of dog biscuits hitting the water to no avail!
There was a real tussle for the lead between Craig Lacey/Dave James, Jason/Leanne McEvoy and Danny Clarke/Nick Singleton. All three pairs had banked a couple of fish with only 20 hours to go before Danny managed another to take the lead before Craig and Dave landed two fish to move clear. Jason and Leanne stormed back with a brace of fish on Sunday morning to move just behind the leaders before the final horn sounded at 1pm. It was a tense finish to the competition which produced just shy of twenty fish. The angler pressure really showed and put the fish off the feed!
Dave and Craig, on their first trip to Upper Tamar, were first out of the draw and chose to fish peg 13 on the Devon Bank which was a new swim created especially for the competition opposite the ever popular bird hide swim. They managed to bank 4 fish for 43lbs and also lost another fish at the net. In what was a really hard weekends fishing they fully deserved the win and vowed to be back in September for the next Pallatrax Open to defend their title!
All the anglers enjoyed a free BBQ during the presentation of the prizes and trophies.
It was great to see some new faces to the venue and some returning competitors. A huge thankyou to Pallatrax for sponsoring the event and to our marshalls (Bob D, Bob O, Terry, Steve G, Ian, Amy and Roger) who did an excellent job transporting tackle, weighing fish and helping out throughout the weekend.

1st Dave James and Craig Lacey 4 fish for 43.00lbs Peg 13
2nd Jason and Leanne McEvoy 4 fish for 37.11lbs peg 25
3rd Nick Singleton and Danny Clarke 3 fish for 29.12lbs peg 4
4th Darren White and Taro Bell 2 fish for 20.05lbs peg 23
5th Jamie Rusling and Scott Bowden 1 fish for 16.07lbs peg 18
6th Phil Gilhespy and Sam Gilhespy 1 fish for 15.08lbs peg 1
7th Ashley Bunning and Aaron Bunning 1 fish for 13.10lbs peg 19
8th Constantine Nitoit and Darby 1 fish for 10.07lbs peg 21

The next Pallatrax Open is 23-25 September and it is another pair’s match, we are now open for entries but be quick!! 01566 771930

http://coarse.swlakesfishing.co.uk/competitions/