Lewis has been an angler ‘forever’, or at least as long as he has any memory of…

Ever since the day he caught a lovely little Gudgeon from the Barge-walk from ‘Ye Olde Father Thames’ at Kingston, just a few days after his 5^th birthday, it’s been much the same…

He caught his first carp by design when he was about 8, fishing amongst the lush stands of pads on the Leg of Mutton pond in Bushy Park with a fibreglass match rod and one of his dad’s cast off Mitchell reels. The bait was a balanced bread hookbait, that he had read about in some encyclopaedia of coarse fishing that had been handed down by someone in the Read family. Throughout this time, Lewis enjoyed any and all aspects of coarse fishing, fishing for the Thames Bream, or if he was really lucky getting a lift to a day ticket lake somewhere within reasonable radius of his family home in Tolworth, but there was an extra level of excitement before a trip to the Leg. In hindsight it was almost certainly the exciting ferocious bites, that would see the rod nearly being dragged in by one of the prolific population of rocket fuelled commons.
Of course there have been distractions along the way –  but Lew has been very lucky to have enjoyed a blessed life being with his ‘Mrs’ (the long suffering Tracy) since they were young’uns, having first ‘got it on’ when they were just both 16 and having been together ever since. She really has the patience of a saint!

Carp-angling-wise, Lewis progressed gradually through local waters learning a little and enjoying himself a lot. The underlying motivation was always to inch up his PB and to gradually learn all the necessary aspects of angling to be reasonably successful wherever I fished. This included watercraft, rigs, formulation of (food) baits and application. These are lifelong goals and I’m pleased to say that I haven’t mastered any of them yet!

In terms of venues he’s fished, the natural progression inexorably led him to waters a little further afield and that were a little more challenging – but always step-by-step. This ultimately meant that he fished a wider range of venues, learning about a range of methods that seemed to work and a solidifying a bit more understanding of what he needed to do to catch a carp or two occasionally. It’s also taught him to recognise when an approach isn’t working and when it is time to adapt and change.

“It’s certainly true that you learn almost as much retrospectively considering your failures, as you do from those wonderful (rare) red letter days – when everything is easy.

It would be remiss of me not to mention all the friends that I have been lucky to make whilst angling, and it’s not a small part of what has made the life long experience so captivating.

Luckily, I just love fishing – any fishing! I always have, and suspect that I always will. It’s so much more than that childlike fascination with any bit of water has endured into adulthood (!) and manifests itself in many ways. Ultimately though it’s expression for most of this time has been as a slightly eccentric carp angler. Having said that, if I can’t go carping, if the lakes are frozen, you’ll invariably find me down the river trying to pester a chevin with a bit of greasy old cheese paste or a bit of flake. However, I have a terrible admission. I’m crap at Perch fishing, but you have to be ‘proper carpy’ to be good at that!”