PHOTO:
Pictured (left to right) are Jon Law, Rod Adamson (Snr), Rod (Jnr) and Phil Lustig (EFSA Wales Chairman & chief organiser)
The 10th annual Welsh Cod (Boat) Championships were recently fished out of Birkenhead in the River Mersey and the Adamson family shone as Rod (Senior) won the competition and son (Rod Junior) came third.
There were 25 competitors, higher than in recent years, and since there was no minimum size, this being a catch and release event, there were bumper catches of cod from the four boats used, though the average size was a bit on the small size.
There were 254 fish caught, measured and released over the two days as the weather over the two days was great.
More fish caught on second day
Saturday morning dawned and at 8am the boats filled up with eager anglers ready for the off. After day one, the Bronze pin winner for the last two years and seasoned Welsh Boat International, Rod Adamson, with 16 cod for 464 points held sway from another Welsh International Boat angler, Jon Law, who, although he caught more in number was a mere 4 points adrift with 18 cod for 460 points.
They both fished off the same boat ‘Girl Grey’ so the skipper must have known something the others didn’t as he also recorded the most fish, 63 on the day. Lying in third was EFSA England member Matt Osborne with 10 cod for 286 points only nine points ahead of another EFSA England angler and previous winner Barrie Senior. But there was still a day to go though with the lead the first two had over the others it looked as if most were fishing for third place and the bronze pin.
Places maintained
In the end the first day’s first two placings were maintained with Rod Adamson increasing his lead over Jon to win by 895 points to 663, having caught an impressive further 15 cod to Jon’s eight. So Rod took the Gold pin and Jon the Silver, his first ever pin.
In third position, taking the Bonze pin, was the other Rod Adamson, son of the winner and again his first pin. He was the Junior winner in 2012 so went one better and is still classified as a junior, who, though lying fifth after day one with nine fish, recorded seven more on day two to climb in to the 3rd pin position.
Grateful thanks
Our thanks go to Phil Lustig for organising the competition, Stan Kucyj for helping get the bait, Ken Gainfort for taking the photos, Ken and Haydn Cole for sorting the bait, Rod for donating trophies, some of the anglers themselves for donating raffle prizes, the Central Hotel, Birkenhead, for their usual hospitality and the boat skippers for finding the fish. We look forward to more and even bigger fish next year and hopefully at least as good an entry.