Ten years on and it’s a 29lb 2oz pike

Persistence paid off for specialist Simon Ashton when he landed this 29lb 2oz pike. The Durham angler was targeting a Lincolnshire trout water, a venue he has been fishing for the last 10 seasons.

He told Angling Times: “I’ve fished the venue four times a year now for a decade, with my previous biggest fish being 19lb. I had a feeling there had to be a bigger pike in there somewhere.

“I’d heard that the perch anglers were catching them on small lures around spawning time. Because of that I decided to use scaled-down tackle – and 10lb braid through to a small rubber lure did the trick.”