Joe revealed:

“Having landed my target from Sandmartin within the month I allocated for it, I decided to turn my attentions back to Kingfisher Lake. I hit the ground running straight away, as on my first session back I landed two twenties off the surface as well as a lovely, deep-bodied common known as Baby Bully at 42lb on a solid bag.

“The following week I tuned up for a long stint, having finished college and with a lot of time of my hands that I may never have again, I decided to really give it a good go. One of the swims on the river bank came free on Kingy, a swim called the LPJ which tends to be a good swim for the time of year as it commands the centre of the lake. I jumped straight in there and planned not to fish the middle due to spots being silted over and not smelling the best. I dropped a couple traps in the edge and fished four nights with nothing. When out of the blue, at 5.10pm on my fifth evening, the right hander went into meltdown, and I lost what felt like a proper good ‘un!

“I dropped the rod back in on a solid bag again with a handful of Krill Active, maize and Bloodworm pellet and only 2 hours later it was away again. The fight was a bit insane to say the least and I had a feeling what fish it was just by the way she was tearing line off the spool, a fish named Lucas!

“She surfaced about 50 yards out and good friend of mine Mick said ‘that’s Lucas that’, so it was all panic from there. Ten minutes passed and she finally come up with a ball of weed on her face and with that she went in the net! We weighed her straight away and at 48lb I was really pleased!

“During the night I was on pest control, as I landed two small mirrors which left me very tired. But needs must and all that, so I just powered on through. I could see a few fish drifting around on the Creek Bank, so I grabbed my floater rod and a bucket of Krill Floaters and biked round there before rush hour! I had a few fish taking within minutes and the Big Ghostie was there which was one I’d been chasing for a while! She took the hookbait after around two minutes of me putting the rod out and I lost her, I was fuming with myself, I had missed my chance!

“The next day came around and it was a bit warmer with less of a breeze on the lake and so I went over to the Lock Bank and there she was, the Big Ghostie with her pals again. I did the same as before and got them feeding confidently before only going and losing her again. I couldn’t believe it she was avoiding me like the plague! Whilst licking my wounds, I found another group of fish at the opposite end of the lake near a big set of pads. I catapulted out some Krill Floaters and got them taking immediately after feeding them for five minutes. I proceeded to catch two lovely twenties before the group drifted away.

“A few days passed, and conditions weren’t the best, with big winds and torrential rain, I was bivvy bound for the next three days. Eventually, the sun came out and I got the floaters back out and I managed to get the Bulldoser and the Ghostie competing; I was bound to catch one of them! After 20 minutes, I got the rod in and it was in five seconds before the Ghostie was on and what a battle it was! They say third times’ a charm and it seemed to ring true this time as after a 30-minute battle, she went in the net! I was buzzing, I’d been chasing her for a while and finally she was mine and at 42lb it made it just that little bit sweeter.”