Tuesday 30.09.00
After a long 22-hour journey in a minibus we arrived in Italy, we were so tired that the scenery, the hotel and its surroundings were ignored. Food and sleep was the highlight of the evening. I think that this was the first and last full nights sleep we had over the whole two weeks.
Wednesday
The English Ladies Team woke up bright and early, expecting to be in a luxurious hotel by a beach or pool, the plan was to go for a swim and then go searching for bait and to look at fishing venues. After looking at our view we decided that the latter part of the plan was the best option, as we were faced with some sort of steel works, with ten of more chimneys puffing out various shades of grey smog, if we reached right out of the window we could just see the sea, a docks with ferries and more smoke. So much for the fabulous Italian scenery!
A few hours later we were armed with various types of worms, some similar to maddies (river rag, reds) in differing sizes called Americanoes, another called a type of tape worm (similar to tube worm) and lastly a very strange worm that spat blood as soon as it was confronted with a hook called Koreanas. Different shops had different baits so we bought all we could find, not sure of what we would be getting in the championships. Rumours in the camp had suggested that calamari could be another bait, but we failed to find one shop that sold this instead we had to settle with cuttle fish. The tackle shops in San Vincenzo proved to be an education to us picking up various odds and ends of rig making gear. Does any angler walk out of a fishing tackle shop with the one item they went in for, we certainly didn’t.
That night and for the following three we practiced on all of our known venues. A local by-law restricted us from fishing on the beaches between the hours of 8am and 7.30pm. We fished as much as we could often getting to the beach early just to be able to see it in daylight. We could not fish the correct times for the tides that we would be fishing in the Championships the following week but that is the same each year as none of us are in a position to afford to pay more to allow us another week practising.
Practice went well we caught many species, some familiar and some new. The fish ranged from staggering congers of 40 to 50cm to 7cm Sarago, Parago, Mormora, and Orata. Some of these fish actually reached double figures on the measuring stick.
We found that various different rigs worked, by keeping a record of what types of main tackle, rigs, hooks and bait caught, what rod we had used and how far we had cast we aimed to try to establish patterns.
Sunday
This was it no more time to practice. We spent today trying to catch up on sleep and getting all our gear ready for the Championships.
Captains meeting was held to establish exactly what venues would be fished and at what times. The competition was to be judged on weight, with only sizeable fish counting. We found that there would be ten ladies teams competing, the most there has been since the start of the Ladies World Championships. Various rules were thrashed out to try to establish that each country understood and had an accurate translation. This is the first time that the captains are told exactly what rules are to apply and our questions can be put to the committee to be answered.
5.30pm and we all waited for coaches to take us to the opening ceremony of the World Fishing Games 2000.
8pm we were in Livorno stadium with crowds of people of different nationalities. This was the first year that all disciplines of Angling were competing in the same country at the same time. For most of us it was the first time to meet members of the big game team, the boat team, various course angling teams, junior teams and casting teams. The atmosphere was brilliant all the English teams talking tactics and wishing each other “tight lines”. The same regards from friends of old, in all nationalities. Then it was time to leave, back to the hotel, ready for the forthcoming battle.
Monday
Practice day.
Practice day is all about getting things right. Making sure that the stewards know how to do their job and making sure that all competitors, stewards, captains and officials know the rules. Despite that we still wanted to do well to build up some team morale. We did quite well even though there were very few fish caught on the whole beach this made us all look at tactics again.