4 days to Lexus Final

Just 4 days to go before the new Lexus Champion is crowned.

100 anglers from all over the UK, plus the Czech Republic, France and Belgium will descend upon Chew Valley Lake near Bristol to compete for the ultimate prize in competition fly fishing - a brand new Lexus RX450 hybrid SUV worth over £50,000.  The person catching the biggest fish at the Grand Final will also win a holiday to Norway in 2012, courtesy of Anglers World Holidays.

Chew has been in superb form all season, but last week saw a green algae bloom which curtailed sport for a while.  Thankfully, the winds and rain of the last few days have dropped the algae out in many parts of the lake and the introduction of 4,000 rainbows will hopefully have stirred the resident fish into action.  By Thursday, as long as weather conditions are favourable, we should be in for a cracking match.

Grafham and Draycote

The last 2 Lexus Heats were held at Grafham Water near Cambridge and Draycote Water near Rugby - both had been fishing well all season, but for the Lexus Heats they were very tricky.  Just 6 fish was sufficient to win the day at Grafham, while Craig Barr's 8 took the honours at Draycote.

The day before the Draycote Heat, I fished a guided day there with my good friend Barry Hawyes and we managed 8 to the boat between us.  The tactics were either Dry Flies, targetting the fish that were moving on top, or a team of nymphs using a 20 foot leader for the other band of trout that were feeding deep.

We had heard of Draycote's reputation  for big fish this season and Barry had the best fish at almost 6lbs - see pic.  It was a fin perfect specimen and reminiscent of a New Zealand rainbow trout.