05/07/25 - Coaching Session - Luckfield Lake.

The day was cooler and slightly more overcast for today’s coaching session at Luckfield Lake. A session that has caused some issues during the run in, but which have now been largely resolved. Our biggest problem now was a lack of available coaches.

Holidays, fishing elsewhere, wooden legs and eyes. Even something called ‘work’ (?) meant that the only brave souls willing to risk their lives and mental health were Jezza, Lloyda, and Graham (er?)...

It was a relief to see no cars in the car park when I arrived. I always feel quite awkward informing people that they missed the list of fixtures and bookings on both club websites, the two messages sent out to the membership, the two signs directing parents to the closed lake, and the sign that has been fixed to the gate for the last seven days. It has happened…But not today. The only one fishing that shouldn’t have been, was a Heron who exited stage left when he saw a tubby coach struggling with a mountain of tackle on a groaning tackle trolley. It really is amazing the amount of gear that it takes to show a child how catch a fish.

With two set ups in position, it was time. Time for the moment that every coach dreads.

The Bog Tent…

Jezza had arrived and was setting up for his own Carp centred session and demo. I told him I was off to erect the ‘Wizz-Wam’ and that if I wasn’t back within 30-minutes, to come and find me. I would probably be found in the loving embrace of an overly affectionate sheet of material. Material that had once dreamed of being a gazebo in a posh garden, or a tent for hardened mountain climbers or adventurers. Instead, it had it had ended up watching bare bottoms do wee wees in a field in Dorset. No wonder it’s always in a bad mood.

The Bog Tent isn’t in great shape and needs to be retired in all honesty. Three of its four spindly legs are broken giving it an odd shape that changes with every gust of wind and added power to really make me angry. As I tried to fix it all together, the top loops kept slipping down the poles like a stripper’s bra strap. First one side, then then other. All the time using the Hazel bushes for support. With no real tension on the elastic in the poles, they kept coming apart with an annoying regularity, and I kept hearing ‘Ta Daaa!’ in my head every time it happened.

I confess to releasing some very bad words into the atmosphere during this process. Words like ‘Fffffah goodness’ sake!’ and ‘Oh, you really are a silly thing, and mildly annoying’. I only hope the baby Owls were out or at least covered their ears, although I genuinely apologised to the box, just in case. (I really did!)

A ’Code Brown’ would round this section of the day off a treat. No code brown, but we did have a code yellow… Paper in the bucket, Wee-Wee to the breeze please. (Recommend being upwind when you do it)…

Only one drop out today. Freddie Hallett couldn’t make because his dad was ‘Combining’. When I read that message I thought ‘I wonder what he is mixing?’

Then I remembered that he worked on a farm, and he was harvesting. The strange way my brain works…

The last job was to do a bit of maintenance in the far side of the lake, so Jezza and I donned our Teletubbie waders. I put mine on because I got into the water. Jerry put his on because he was chatting to Lloyd on dry land whilst I did all the work…

Brambles and Cow Parsley were largely removed, but we ran out of time as the juniors were starting to arrive. I wished I’d put some gloves on really because the brambles were a bit scratchy. I knew I’d been scratched when Lloyd gave me some hand cleanser which stung like something angry that stings a lot. I got my own back. It was Lloyd’s turn to take down the toilet tent…Remember the code yellow?

The day (eventually) started with a fine tutorial by Uncle Jerry who spoke to us about how important it is to look after these beautiful creatures in the best way we can. We were shown how to organise ourselves to be ready to care for a fish, not just Carp, by arranging things like unhooking mats, scales, water buckets, forceps, and injury treatments. Even Colin the plushie cushion Carp came out to help out, despite Jerry wanting to dunk him in the lake! The tutorial gave Jerry the chance to demonstrate his ‘new’ floating weigh sling. I say new, he’s had it in the garage for nearly 20-years, but you just can’t rush some things. (true story)…

I think we all learned lots from it and there is a certain joy to watching a 62-year-old man trying to get off his knees in front of a crowd whilst maintaining a shred of dignity.

Good job mate…

Following this, I gave a short-ish demo of paste fishing to a couple of our newest juniors which resulted in as many real fish as Jerry had in his tutorial. None. But I think they got the idea, and the proof was in the pudding dished out later.

It was a frantic day, and we didn’t get round to using any PVA. Maybe another time…

Jayce Hardware and Jake had settled into peg one and had managed to connect with a couple of lively Carp who had given them the slip. The third fish to fall for the trap had made its way into the middle of a lily pad and wasn’t coming out. The fish was lost again and, like all good anglers do, Jayce blamed someone else for his misfortunes. This time it was Jake who bore the brunt of the lad’s venom. They were going to fish on after the coaching session, but Jayce was in the van before I got back to the car park. I imagine it was a quite journey home.

Fishing is a funny old sport. Sometimes it rewards your efforts and another it will laugh in your face. It’s unpredictable and that’s why we love it so much. I do recognise that it is difficult to tell a grumpy child that just ‘being outside in the fresh air is enough’, when his peers are catching elsewhere on the lake…

But, that’s fishing folks…

Freddie Campbell came speedwalking round to p3 (because they’re not allowed to run) to tell me that he’d caught a personal best Carp of 16lbs 3ozs! I already knew that something special had happened because, from the other side of the lake, I saw Jerry removing his jacket. Something he only does for a large fish, or for a fight. His body language did not suggest that the Wookie had been released, so I assumed that it was the former.

As you can see, it was a belter. His face says more than words ever could, and he even topped the day off with a second fish of 8lbs.

The fish was weighed and recorded and is a very worthy contender for the Specimen fish of the year trophy, which I hoped we would get from today to be honest.

Well done Kiddo!

Our two newest anglers were in the next two pegs and so was I for a lot of the day. I think I wore the path between these two pegs (3 & 4) about two inches deeper as I oscillated back and forth betwixt the two differently demanding juniors.

Finn, my ‘Bweem’ friend from a taster session last week, was in p3 and ‘Tired Luke’ was plopped into p4. They are chalk and cheese in both age and character. Finn won’t stop talking and Luke barely makes a coherent sound. But it was a challenge to be two different people when talking to each. Sometimes I got it wrong, particularly towards the end of the day when I get tired. I’m sure at one point I bounced up to Luke and asked a 6-year-old question like ‘What’s your favourite colour Penguin?’ Similarly, I asked a 6-year-old if he knew what an Acronym was… They both gave the same confused look of ‘Are you ok?’…

Luke was wearing shorts and a T-shirt with a jacket. Finn was wearing a thermal body condom that zipped from the right ankle to the left shoulder. I fell asleep last night wondering how one gets into and out of such a garment.

Makes a change from dreaming about pony’s I guess…

Luke wanted to know how to set up rods and reels for feeder and float fishing, so I set him some homework to learn how to tie figure of eight loop knots so we can do something next time out.

Finn had been desperate all day to show me his casting skills.

I’ve seen this before, ‘Look what I can do’, as the feeder hits the water at 300 miles an hour, or lands on the bank behind them. But Finn launched a feeder almost to the rope (a good 30 to 35 metres away) three times on the bounce! There may have been some direction variation between each cast, but we can work on that!

Both managed to catch some Carps on Paste, so my work was done for the day…

Well done both…

Next up was Master Harry Willmer accompanied by his dad, who had turned into his mum at lunchtime. I knew the switch was happening, but I didn’t witness it occur. A seamless effort all round…

I need to apologise to Harry for not getting round to showing him a bit of paste fishing, but the day ran away from me…

Harry demonstrated some accurate casting into some jungly looking margins. Sadly, I didn’t get them all done. If only there were more people around to help…(?)

Harry managed to extract a nice looking common and so was pleased with his day.

Sarah was recovering from seeing Oasis only a few hours before. I gave her my sincere condolences and asked if she was there voluntarily or against her will.

Apparently, and bizarrely, it was through choice…(?)

Thomas had roared into peg nine with Teresa fast in tow. She was a little put out by the fact that there was no room to erect the marquee they call a bivvy and shot me a stern look when I said she need not worry because Lloyd had promised it was not going to rain. The stare was lifted from me and placed squarely on Lloyd, which I was fine with…

T: Where you do think I should fish?

G: Under that tree is a good spot, there’s always fish under there.

T: I’ve got one here (margin), and I’m going to put one over there (The Middle).

(He casts to the middle, arguably beyond where he should have perhaps)

T: Do you think I’ll catch there?

G: What I think is that you should ask a tubby bespectacled coach with lots of experience where he would cast…

T: Do you know anyone like that?

At this point I turned to Teresa who was in fits laughing and shrugged my shoulders…

A small Carp, and F1, and a snotty Bweem were Thomas’s rewards today. Good job.

Alexander and Charlie were last on the list today and the littlest angler had only a small F1 to show for his efforts. I wandered round to see if I could change the direction of his fortune, and Charlie took this opportunity to answer the call of nature.

A slightly sad, puppy like distress descended over young Alexander as he rubbed his foot on the wire covering the wooden bridge/walkway.

G: You know what they call that stuff, don’t you?

A: No?

G: It’s chicken wire. To keep all the chickens in so they don’t escape.

A: Chickens? Silly Graham (laughing)

G: It’s true. There are small troll chickens living under there. Can you hear them?

A: I’ve got chickens at home, and they make lots of noise. I can’t hear any chickens, (laughing), Silly Graham…

G: These are rare silent troll chickens, they don’t make any noise. In fact, they are quite old. So old, they only come in black and white. They only eat pink marshmallows and we only feed them twice a month. They only come out at night and stop the rats from watching too much telly when they should be asleep…

A: (now giggling uncontrollably), Silly Graham…

Charlie returned to a child she’d left almost in tears, who now was barely standing from laughing. Alexander told his mum about the old, black and white silent troll chickens that live under the bridge who stop telly addicted rodents from watch too much Tv….

C: What on earth have you two been talking about???

To close the session, I hosted a tongue in cheek tutorial about using the combined (not harvested) power of warm soapy water and noodle mitten (Sponge) to remove dirt from fishing tackle. This miracle of science makes everything clean and last longer if you do it regularly… It was supposed to be a light-hearted dig at some who turn up with dirt from the previous year on their equipment. I expected some looks of ‘yeah, you’re a funny guy, nice one’.

What I saw were faces of astonishment and pure disbelief at the alchemy that was unfolding before them. Who would have thought that a bucket, soapy water, and a sponge would turn out to be my most intense demonstration to date?

I’m mentally and physically worn out, but it’s been a great day.

(Nearly) Everyone went home happy, no gear in the trees, and all heeded my warning about casting too close to the aerator. A successful day for the juniors at Luckfield.

More than ever today I need to thank Jerry and Lloyd for their efforts. Brilliant job guys, great tutorial, and some giggles along the way. Thank you…

Our next event is on the 11th July at Revels for the 4th round of the knockout on the Middle Lake. Those who have qualified already can come for a practice.

After that we have a match/coaching at Revels on the 19th July.

It is a while away, but it will be here soon enough. The Senior/Junior Pairs Match is on Hillview Lake at Todber Manor on the 13th of September. I will start to take entries for teams from now onwards. First team is:

Alec Campbell & Graham Howard.

(For those who don’t know, Juniors must ask a parent who holds a current rod licence and club membership, or a coach who is named member of our team OR has volunteered THIS YEAR. I will post a list of eligible coaches on WhatsApp in the next day or so.

If you know your team and the junior has asked the adult (as per the rules), then let me know through private message on WhatsApp.

The winning team is decided by points (Juniors against juniors, seniors against seniors) or by weight in the event of a tie.)

See you on the bank! Juniors Sec...