Confidence Trickster

STEVE COLLETT Britain’s leading all-round angler loves taking on challenges at all kinds of venues. Read his triumphs and disasters, warts ‘n’ all, exclusively in AM.

I HAVE lost count of the number of top anglers that I have been fortunate enough to have fished with over the years.

I’ve shared a bank with late greats, including John Wilson, Bob Church and the Mail’s own Frank Barlow, and modern legends, including Alan Scotthorne, Andy Bennett, Andy May, and numerous others.

One thing resonates with all of them, and they all have it in abundance: confidence.

It’s not a cocky confidence, more of a reassuring kind of self-belief.

This week’s legend has just that, but it has come at a certain price: time.

It’s John ‘Pimmy’ Pimlott. He is a legend on the River Ribble, as I’m sure you have noted before in my weekly babble.

Every time I go with him I learn something new and today was no different.

The river was kind of out of sorts, and in a matter of hours, we would be facing yet another deluge of rain, as a huge storm was forecast, bringing with it as much as 20 mm of rainfall in an hour.

A quick call to Pimmy reassured me that, despite a chilly easterly wind, air pressure up and down like a naughty person’s drawers, and a high river, we would catch fish. Now there's confidence.

I didn’t have the same enthusiasm, and that dampened, even more, when he told me how far we had to walk – well over a mile. I must be getting soft as the years pass.

This is one of the other things that stands out with Pimmy. He puts the work in, and doesn’t even bat an eyelid at the thought of walking a mile if it means there are barbel waiting.

I can’t imagine any of the modern Trent or Severn anglers wanting to walk more than a Ford Transit’s length these days.

Arriving at the swim, feeling a little jiggered, my heart sank a bit more as soon as I saw the swim.