Susan captains England Ladies to gold medal victory

Lough Mask, Eire

Susan Sissons, of Bolsover, Derbyshire, has once again captained the England Ladies Flyfishing team to victory in 2005.

Susan has fished for England for the past seven consecutive years - giving her seven home international caps. She also represented the England Ladies in the European Flyfishing Championships last year in Sweden and recently in Poland - giving her two European caps.

She led the England squad to victory on Eire’s Lough Mask, Thursday 2nd June 2005. In typical Irish weather conditions with winds 20 to 30 miles per hour and bucketing with rain, the team notched up a good win against the odds, using traditional Irish wet fly pulling techniques, taking 17 fish. The Scots were second with 12 fish, the Irish third with 12 fish and the Welsh fourth with 5 fish.

Practice Day

During the two practice days the light winds on the Tuesday resulted in the team catching mainly on nymph and buzzers tactics with the occasional Wulff pattern dry fly working, but as the wind increased on Wednesday and into Thursday the only tactic was wet fly pulling techniques.

Line choice

The most productive line was the Cortland Blue, which just broke the water surface and resulted in better hook-ups.

Best patterns

The most successful flies during the match were the Melvin Octopus, Golden Olive Bumble, and a Fiery Brown patterns. Many fish were in evidence on the day with competitors rising a lot of fish but with limited hook-ups.

Steve Newsome, expert fly-dresser and A.T. contributor accompanied the team, tying flies the ladies identified as winners. A big thanks to Steve for his time.

The England Ladies team are pictured with the Bob Church Trophy for winning the event.

The other trophies awarded to England are:- Anne Marshall Rose Bowl (England v Scotland), Wendy Miller Anglo Irish Cup (England v Ireland), Moc Morgan Cup (Wales v England), Bord Failte Irish Tourist Board Trophy (England, Scotland and Wales)

The England Team consisted of Susan Sissons (Captain), Jayne Alecock, Linda Dearing, Maggie Godwin, Mary Hopper, Sally Hunt, Sue Hunter, Mairi McFarlane, Wendy Miller, Jane Percy, Stevie Rayner, Kate Royce, Hilary Tomlinson, Dawn Turner, Jacqueta Hamilton (Reserve) and Paul Miller (Manager).

They would all like to thank; Dick Tallants at Cortland Masterline, Chris Hartley at Guide Flyfishing and Bill Hatton at Maui Jim for their support. Susan would also personally like to thank Dale Robinson of Portable Access Ltd. Worksop for his direct support.