FIPSed Carp Fishing World Championship, Pietrafitta, Italy 24-27th September 2014

Match Report by Ian Huntington, Korda Carp Team Manager

The 16th FIPSed World Carp Angling Championship took place from 24th – 27th September at Lake Pietrafitta, situated in the Umbria region of central Italy. 24 Nations took from all over the world with the event attracting two new nations from the USA and Israel fishing for the first time.

Korda Carp Team England were competing in their 10th championships since their first in 2005. England had practiced at the venue three weeks earlier and were in confident mood at the time of the draw. Having a record 24 countries against normally 20 countries that attended the same event on this water in 2011 made a big difference to the pegging, with part of sections A in an area that did not normally allow carp fishing due to a gabion cage stone wall rising ten feet up in the water in the last three pegs at the 80 meter mark. The other two sections also had problem pegs in areas squeezed to as little as 30 paces apart.
England drew 16th and pulled out ball 23 which gave them peg 23A, a near end peg for Billy and Jamie, Peg 9 in B section which was in a bay on a tight radius and 30 paces from either side for Jack and Kia. And our third peg was 17C for Jake and Dan Wildbore, which again was in the only bay on C section and together with two other pegs in the same bay was 50 metres back from the rest of the line.

It was evident early on that England was in trouble with the draw as the near end peg in section A had the underwater wall which was virtually impossible to real a lead back over on the retrieve never mind land a fish. This would prove costly as the match developed.  However, some good news came just before dark in section B for Kia and Jack in the shape of an 11.04kg common carp which shot them straight into 2nd place in section. By morning things were still very slow in all sections with very little being caught overnight however, Jake and Dan had managed a 5kg fish to get them off the mark. A little later Billy and Jamie added a small 3kg fish which also got them on the score sheet.

So after 18 hours England had managed to scratch their way into 3rd place due to the fact that only three nations had caught by this time in all three sections. After a brief discussion with Jake and Dan on the first morning we thought it practical to deploy Mark Bartlett into our peg on C section, due to England being at a massive disadvantage on having to find the extra range. Make no mistake, Jake and Dan were fishing and baiting effectively at 140m. But being so far back in the bay they were at a massive disadvantage to the rest of the section. Mark Bartlett is the best caster in the team and in the right conditions can fish effectively at 175m plus.  So on moving into the swim he made almost an instant impact by catching the pair another fish at massive range.

At the late afternoon scores at around the 30 hours point England had slipped to 5th as more teams managed to catch a fish in each section, with Croatia catching well on all pegs and now starting to run away with the event on only 6 penalty points. By late afternoon on day two England had managed to recapture 4th in front of Italy.  With less than 24 hours of the match remaining Russia climbed the leader board and had passed England and Italy into 4th place. The last night changed things again, not for the first three places but for England and Italy who had both gone past Russia by the morning results with Italy again in 4th and England in 5th place. With 2 hours to go the news was passed onto the England pair in C section that they only needed one decent fish in the 5kg region for England to go past Italy and re-capture 4th spot. At this point Mark Bartlett advised that his wife had gone into labour back home and was it all right for him to be substituted so he could leave the event as he could get a flight back.  Later mark confirmed a new addition to his family a baby girl of 6lb 10oz and we wish him all the very best.   Back at the match the substitution had taken place with Pete Holehouse being dusted down and shipped into the peg. Mark together with Jake had had a great match lifting this unfancied peg from no-where to 5th position in C section. With about an hour remaining one of the rods burst into life and Jake duly landed the 5.5kg fish to secure England in 4th place clear by a two point margin over 5th place Italy.

Congratulations to Croatia who fished a perfect match to maintain their well-deserved first place with a near perfect 4 penalty points. Congratulations also to France and their 2nd position with 10 points and 3rd Belgium with 14 points. England were 4th on 21 points and Host nation Italy finishing 5th on 23 points.

Results
Individual World Champions and Gold medallist Banaj & Jakopcevic, Croatia (section A), 143.755kg
Silver Farge & Neyrat France (Section C) 124.805kg
Bronze Delic & Stanic Croatia (section B) 78.880kg

England positions:
Section A 10th position Jamie Londors & Billy Flowers 23.965kg
Section B 7th Position Jack Stamp and Kia Sanger 13.615kg.
Section C 4th Position Dan & Jake Wildbore , 56.690kg

(Mark Bartlett . Pete Holehouse reserves)

A big thanks from all of us for the support the Korda England Team received, especially to our very generous sponsors Dan, Damian and Ali at Korda Developments Limited, without whose support it would be impossible for England to attend these events.  A big thank you also to all the companies in the Korda Family who so generously provided bait and equipment.  Also the individual angler sponsors who all played a part. Thanks also to the Angling Trust, and Dick Clegg for his personal support for the management and the team. On the bank special thanks to all the anglers who never gave up for a single second and never stopped trying for the team.  Also special thanks to on the bank support crew Pete Holehouse, and Lee “Wee man” Rogers, not forgetting the Korda camera crew Neal, Elbow and Shaun who kept the entertainment flowing while filming.  Last but not least, thanks to Italy for putting on another successful world championships with their superb hospitality and sense of fair play!

Dick Clegg, OBE, International Events Manager, Angling Trust stated “The FIPSed World Carp Championships have continued to grow year on year and Italy provided the venue for the 2014 competition after Romania was refused permission to organise the event at a very late stage.  Complications regarding the legitimacy of the Romanian Federation resulted in the championship being moved to Lake Pietrafitta where host country Italy had organised the 2011 event.  The move proved to be very popular on a venue that was known to hold some huge fish a far cry from the exceptionally poor Portuguese Montargil reservoir of 2013.  An Italian angler had a fish of 17.140 kilos and England a fish of 12.950 kilos with 14 teams recording catches to include at least one fish of more than 10 kilos. I can see that this suited Korda Team England and I congratulate them after finishing in a very creditable 4th position, but at the same time I must sympathise with both the team and management after just missing out on a podium place.”