Seven carp headed by 53lb 10oz pb at Grenville

Paul Bennett bagged his third personal best in a year and his first British fifty during a session at Cambridgeshire’s Grenville Lake.
Deciding to fish on the back of strong south-westerly winds, the fishery officer baited heavily and reaped the rewards with this
53lb 10oz mirror (below) and others of 35lb 4oz, 27lb 10oz, 26lb 14oz, 20lb 9oz, 20lb 7oz and 20lb 4oz.
He said: “What a winter carp session! I’m simply blown away, and I will be for some time to come.”
After a quiet first night, Paul introduced 10kg of Mad Baits boilies at lunchtime on his second day and didn’t have to wait long for the big mirror to make an appearance.
He said: “At about 1.30pm I received a single bleep on my middle rod so I was out of the bivvy to see what was happening – the bobbin hit the rod with two more bleeps and it was away. The rod hooped right over and stayed there. For a few seconds it was as if I’d hooked the bottom!
“I then felt very heavy movement as the fish suddenly decided to take some line and I thought it felt a good one. It wasn’t until it was roughly 20 yards out that I got my first glimpse and I thought it was possibly a big thirty. It went absolutely berserk in the deep margin but I eventually netted it after a 20-minute battle.
“On looking at my prize filling my net my reaction was, ‘Oh my God, that is big – very, very big!’.”
Grenville boss Paul Ward was summoned to witness the fish and confirmed it was now the lake’s second-biggest carp and one that was last caught 18 months ago at 44lb 4oz.