How I caught the THAMES RECORD
Last month NICK HELLEUR banked the fish of his dreams, weighing 50lb 12oz, after a two-year quest on Britain’s most famous river. This month in a Carpfeed exclusive he reveals the lengths he had to go to in order to reach his goal …
“The fight was a complete nightmare. The fish pulled so hard that it moved the boat off its rear anchor...”
IN THE early hours of October 12th 2018, a catch was made from the River Thames that sent waves of shock and awe in equal measure coursing through the British carp scene.
As the sun came up on that Friday morning, Nick Helleur was hoisting aloft a fish of astonishing beauty and proportions for the cameras. It weighed 50lb 12oz, and not only set a new record for the River Thames, it also marked the culmination of a long and dedicated quest by Nick to catch one of the waterway’s fabled giants.
Soon after he came back down to earth, we spoke to Nick about the historic catch, and how it all unfolded. There’s only one place to start Nick – tell us about the night it all came together… “I’d anchored my boat up away from the bank on the Thursday evening, got everything sorted and cast out. Over the next few hours I caught five or six bream in quick succession, before the action suddenly ceased. I had a glass of wine, listened to the radio, and I was having a lovely time. Then, at about 10pm I heard a big ‘slosh’ out in the river, and the all the coots went wild.
“Not long after that I must’ve fallen asleep, because it was the early hours that I had the take. If I’m honest, had I lost it I would have said it was an upper-20 common – it was a very fast take, like one from a tuna!
“The fight that followed was a complete nightmare – it was a farce. The fish pulled so hard that it moved the boat off its rear anchor on the marginal shelf, and it was pulling the boat round as I was playing it. It was an absolute beast of a fight that lasted 40 minutes or more.
“I initially thought it was a common, but then I glimpsed its linear scaling as it neared the net in the thick mist. When I realised what it was, my heart was racing and I was actually sick – I pulled a proper whitey. I swear I aged 10 years that night!” Incredible stuff. So, working backwards, how long had you been fishing the area? “I’d been fishing it for three months and was initially planning to target the spot later in the autumn, but the capture of two twenties during an earlier session brought forward my plans.
“I was fishing a stretch of the middle river from my cabin cruiser, which requires a lot more effort than it might sound. With the boat on a trailer, each trip to the spot from the access slipway involved going through two locks as part of a two-hour journey.” Had you been introducing much bait beforehand? “Yes, I’d been baiting up very heavily with 40lb of peanuts at a time, flavoured with half a kilo of the hottest chilli powder I could find, 500g per bucket, and lots of salt, plus glugged Sticky Krill boilies. I wanted to bait up with something that would ‘flavour the bottom’ if you like, effectively creating a lasting smell and taste in the area even when the bait had been eaten, and I like to use peanuts because they are cheap and will only really get eaten by the carp.
“My plan was to ‘feed them to an area’, and that’s effectively what I did. I was trying to build a spot. Nobody else was fishing there and with the head of bream present you seriously couldn’t have put enough bait in! I wouldn’t hesitate to give them a big bucket full of bait a few days before I went.” What did you use for hookbaits? Big boilies? “Yes, snowman presentations made from heavily glugged Sticky Krill bottom baits (20mm Tuff Ones) with Signature Squid pop-ups on top. I like
to use the 20mm baits, as I want these to be eaten only by the carp. The bigger and tougher the baits, the less likely they are to be eaten by the smaller fish.
“I always like to tip my hookbaits with a bit of colour, as not only will this help to pull the fish down it also makes it bigger, so more impervious to the smaller fish in the river. Generally, if the water is coloured I use a white popup as a tipper, and if it’s clear I go for a pink one instead. The Signature Squids absolutely stink too, making them an ideal addition to any bottom bait.” Big rivers like the Thames can be pretty unforgiving on tackle. Talk us through your set-up Nick… “There’s no room for finesse or weak links. As well as the fish, you’re battling the environment. The Thames is littered with snags and unseen obstacles in places, not to mention drifting weed and the strength of the flow itself.
“The carp in our rivers are rarely rig shy, but fight like demons so it pays to err on the side of caution to prevent any dramas unfolding. The last thing you need is to go through all the hard work of locating and priming a spot, only to lose a potentially big and wild carp through inadequate terminal tackle.
“When I caught the fish, the weed has just started to break up, and during the fight I was having to put the rod down and pull handfuls of rotting streamer weed off the line – I must’ve done that half a dozen times – but sometimes you’re name’s on a fish, and my name was on this one!
“My rods were 10ft Wychwood Extricators in 3lb test curve, paired with powerful big pit reels loaded with 20lb mainline.
“At the business end I use a lead-clip set-up carrying a 3oz-4oz lead, a long coated braid hooklink, and a stronglyforged size 5 hook. The most important thing is to drop the lead. It’s absolutely essential to do so because of the amount of weed about, and the power of the fish.
“Above my rig I had a length of heavy tungsten tubing to pin down the last metre or two, combined with a quickrelease backlead. These are absolutely vital for carp fishing on rivers, not only to