I recently enjoyed some success at White Acres at the start of the festival season and managed to finish sixth overall on the first big ‘un of 2010. The clincher was a section win on Porth Reservoir which I achieved using Sonu Baits' F1 Groundbait.

The F1 groundbait from Sonu Baits is, in a word, awesome. Not only is it good for F1s and small carp, but skimmers absolutely adore it. Porth is full of small skimmers but there are also some proper bream to be had and I don’t know why but they always seem to crop up on the pole line. I have a system for Porth which involves a pole and feeder attack. On the pole line I will usually ball in eight to ten jaffas of F1 groundbait carrying just a few dead red maggots.

The groundbait is mixed the night before so that it is inert, and the beauty of F1 groundbait is that you can mix it either light or heavy, so it is extremely versatile.
After balling in the groundbait,I then pick up the feeder rod and catch what I can on the feeder, casting 30 to 35 yards. Again, the groundbait is Sonu Baits' F1, and the key to success at Porth is to try to keep putting something in the net. I keep my eyes open and watch the anglers around me. As a rule, I try to resist going on to the pole line for at least three hours because sometimes the bream take a while to come in. But if I see other anglers catching on the pole then I know it is worth having a look.

In the match which got me into the main frame on the Bait Tech Festival, I started on the feeder and had a look on the pole after three hours without a bite. As the final hour came around I chucked my feeder on to my pole line and caught a skimmer. On the pole I could not manage a bite but I felt this was because it was windy and this was hampering good presentation. I decided to take the feeder off and replace it with a bomb, and in the final hour casting on to the pole line, I caught a 4lb bream plus seven other skimmers to finish with just under 10lb, enough to win the lake. Red maggot and pieces of worm were the hookbaits and the hooks of choice were the Preston PR34.