Our first Video Gallery will contain several clips of balling-in and playing fish (sometimes large carp) over practice week and the actual 2-day tournament. For reasons of overload, we shall only place a few videos within each of the Galleries we create. As more videos are made, we shall add other Galleries, which will be available through the Contents page. We hope you enjoy them.
Our first Video Gallery clip is of Frances' Alain Dewimille balling-in on Friday' final practice session. As you can see, Alain starts feeding short at 8m with of relatively small size and in a wide area. He then proceeded to ball-in on the 13m line with several hard balls before sending in lots of larger and softer balls which break up on the surface, creating a cloud in the swim...called Tapis de Terre. We produced a feature on this techniques sometime ago and it seems that this was effective in several areas on the canal. (see Balling-in with Alain Dewimille) The outcome of Alain's Friday practise session was inconclusion for him, he only weighed in just over 3 kilos. But it was from one of the worse parts of the venue, the one Tamas mentioned in our Friday Diary! It was also interesting to see that Alain did not feed any small feed balls at 13m!
Dieter forgets something! Holland's Dieter Friederichs drew end peg on E section...the very last peg on the match length, and had a great chance of winning the section and thereby taking a podium place. His feeding strategy rested with less initial balls of groundballs (only 13), but more cupped-in feed. But to do this you need a cupping kit! And what had Dieter forgot to set up...yes, a cupping kit. A hasty return to his rod holdall and he was soon back to feeding his 13m line. For all of you who wish to improve your cupping in, watch Dieter closely, as we did. His technique was exceptional and a perfect lesson to us all. He managed, including getting and setting up his cupping kit, to cup in SIXTEEN balls at 13m and another five at 7m...and still have time to have a drink before the 'all-in'. Note: We're not sure where USA competitor Johns Wilkins went to. He seemed to have also forgot to do something! He was A.W.O.L for over four minutes! It must be added that this was the first time he had ever participated at this level and on this type of stage. He will learn much from his visit to Italy.
You win some... The Dutch were early on the carp with two of their team taking fish during Thursday's practice session. ...you lose some! In complete contrast was South Africa's Jaco Goodwin on Saturday, who found a somewhat larger than average fish give him a cracking time trying to land it. So cracking in fact, that it snapped his top sections in three places and, as a consequence, gained it's freedom. It undoubtadely cost him the section win, but he still finished second in section with a weight of 10,430kgs. He only had FIVE fish for that, so the others obviously didn't get away!!!
From 'Zero', to nearly 'Hero'! The canal's large carp played an important role for many individula anglers, but they had little bearing on the team results. Here's a couple of fish that shot their captures' from the bottom of the section, to nearly the top of it on the final day. First we have the Croatian Nenad Viboh on B36 who's fish took him to second in section. Then we had a mammoth tussle between Serbia's Goran Radovic, previously known for his barbel exploits, and a rather large wild common.That shot him from a 'zero' position in his section, to a solid 4th place. Much to his delight! He shall henceforth be now known as 'Mr Carpes' (that's an 'in' joke between us).
