LEICESTER angler Lee McManus has continued his terrific run of form by catching this 17lb 14oz barbel from the River Trent.
It’s his new personal best, and was taken during a real red-letter session that also included three more doubles weighing 15lb, 14lb 1oz and 10lb 11oz, along with an eight-pounder.
Lee kept his tactics simple, using long hooklinks on free-running rigs with 6oz leads. Rather than cast mid-river, he fished a spot just a rodlength out from the bank and used large chunks of luncheon meat for hookbaits.
He recast every few hours with a PVA bag of pellets nicked on to the hook to keep a trickle of bait going through the swim.
Interestingly, Lee revealed that he’s had more success when adopting this conservative loosefeeding approach than he has when piling it in with a Spopper, as many anglers on the Midlands river tend to do.
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