A boilie grinder helped me smash my personal best pike - Rob Malseed

“It was a Friday and, having finished work, I arrived at my Essex syndicate. I deposited three deadbaits at varying distances from the bank with my bait boat – one to a 10ft-deep spot at 50 yards, another in the margins and a final bait between the two at around 25 yards. 

Sadly, though, it was a quiet night and by 3pm the next day I hadn’t had so much as a bleep, so I decided to reel in and swap the deadbaits for some fresh ones. 

I put lamprey and smelt on two of the rods, but I had also packed this giant herring which was around 1ft long! I’d normally cut a bait this size in half, but I had nothing to lose so I just stuck it on whole.

Before I shipped the baits back out to their spots I realised I had an unopened boilie grinder at the bottom of my tackle bag and had what you might call a bit of a brainwave…

I filled it with pieces of chopped mackerel, sardine and herring and mushed them up. Then, I poured the mush into the compartment in my bait boat, added maggots and breadcrumb and ferried it out to each of my three marks, before using the boat again to drop my rigs and deadbaits back into position.

I hadn’t put the last rod down when the herring rod at 25 yards bleeped a couple of times then signalled a single-toner!

I was quick to strike, but saw my line kite fast to my right, so it was a bit of a panic trying to keep up with it.

There were a few heavy tugs but I didn’t think the fish was that special, at least until I saw the slap of its tail at the net and thought: “This could be the one.”

This was the first pike that had ever scared me – its shoulders were massive!

The feeling of seeing the scales pull round to over 30lb was overwhelming. I’d waited 20 years for this moment.

All those years of blanking made me think outside the box, and now I have a new personal best of 33lb 4oz because of it. 

It just goes to show that by being brave and trying new things you will eventually get the result you want.”