“I’d invited Phil Ringer to fish a guest ticket on my syndicate lake for bream and, although I’d managed to net a few, he’d had 10 to a best of 12lb 6oz.
“While the bream fishing was slow I decided to bait another spot with dead maggots in the hope of catching an eel, but I started off with a free-running rig and had several dropped runs.
“To stop this from happening I switched to a bolt rig with a 2.5oz lead and a size 2 longshank hook baited with two half lobworms and 10 dead maggots.
“I cast the rig back out to its spot and within a couple of hours I received a screaming run and struck into what felt like a big eel.
“After a short fight I netted what turned out to be a new personal best at 4lb 5oz – get in!
“It was hooked perfectly in the lip too which the bolt rig had definitely helped to achieve.”