How Brad Hancock won the £25,000 Parkdean Masters title
Some big names have clutched the famous silver Parkdean Masters trophy and £25,000 winner’s cheque. Brad Hancock can now add his name to that list after a tight finish to this year’s final on Jenny’s Lake at White Acres in Cornwall.
Brad is, by his own admission, more of a club angler where matches are concerned but also enjoys specimen hunting for big barbel and chub on the Rivers Don and Trent. He’s also a regular at White Acres, fishing the residents’ matches and the occasional festival, with some success.
Making his Parkdean debut, the Sheffield man weighed in 57-9-0 of carp, F1s and carassio from peg 35 to just get the nod by one carp ahead of Ben Dales’ 52-6-0. Victory left him stunned at not only the biggest match win, but also that £25,000!
Parkdean resorts Steve Griffiths presents 2020 champion Brad Hancock with a cheque for 25k
“I’ve fished White Acres for nine years, but have never got close to doing well in one of the big festivals, let alone making the Parkdean final,” Brad said.
“This year qualifying was a bit different. Because of Covid, there were no spring festivals, so the top eight weights from all the residents’ matches through the summer went through, and I was one of those. I also finished in the top eight of the Preston Innovations festival.
“Jenny’s Lake is not one I know well, having only fished it a few times, making it hard to work out a target weight and where you wanted to draw.
“I got the impression that pegs 15 to 17, 21, 4, 7 and 8 were banker draws, so when I got peg 35 it seemed as if I was far away from where I wanted to be! But it looked like being a tight, low-weight match where flyers might not be as good as we all thought.”
At the peg
“Peg 35 gave me the point of one of the islands to cast to with a feeder, and my mind was made up when I plumbed up my pole line at 13m – it was just 2ft deep! I couldn’t see me catching enough to win there, so it was looking like an out-and-out rod match.
“The swim was a little deeper close to the island at around 3ft, getting a bit deeper the further away I came from it, so I settled on fishing the pellet feeder with three dead red maggots on the hook. I thought pellets might be too selective, so I went for maggots to try and catch everything that came along.
“The opening hour wasn’t great, and I only caught a small F1 and a carassio casting a 20g pellet feeder to the island. This lack of action seemed to be the case everywhere.
“In hours two and three, I started to get indications on the tip, showing me fish were there. That helped me decide to stay on the feeder. I began casting more regularly, every three or four minutes, to get some bait in and try and get the fish to have a go. Three carp and some carassio went into the net, but they were small carp.”
Brad kicked off with mainly small carp and carassio
Moving away
“As the match wore on, bites from casting to the island seemed to be fading. Moving a few feet away from the island into deeper water helped, and I snared a couple more carp and some carassio and F1s, but was having to cut right back on how often I was casting. It became obvious there were fewer and fewer fish in the peg. A sixth small carp showed up late in the day.
“In the closing stages, the cameras were behind me, so I knew I must be doing something right! Thinking about my total weight, which I felt was around 50lb-plus, it was in the region of the pre-match target I’d set, but a little bit of me thought that someone somewhere must have caught a bit more than me.
“When my weight was confirmed and I knew I’d won, it was a mad moment and a real shock! Just one fish separated Ben and me, that’s how close it was. I guess I was in disbelief that it had happened to me!