The Inter Services this year was bedeviled by accommodation problems, which Mark Glass stepped in to sort out. Two Lodges were obtained by Mark in the Married Patch at RAF Wittering for Associates and "Rantings" and the Officers were billeted in RAF Cottesmore. The spreading out of people had the effect of reducing the information flow and our normal practice of having a structured depief at the end of each day didn't happen. The value of daily depiefs was pought into stark relief by our performance in the actual competition.

The First day's practice (Friday) went well with some poor results in the morning being improved upon by going to the right place and using a method that had worked well for Chris Anderson in the morning. Chris managed to Bag Up but his boat partner Mark Glass recorded his first blank on Rutland for as long as he can remember (short memory!).

On Saturday we had the professional help of Craig Barr to act as our coach. We gained useful local knowledge as well as the four people who had Craig in their boat getting detailed coaching and first hand experience of how Craig fishes. Our two most experienced rods, Tony and Ron spent time with Craig and extracted more from the experience than many of us would. On Sunday the remainder of the squad arrived at various times during the morning with some not making it until as late as 1400. Results on Sunday were patchy and despite having a detailed depief of the day from Craig Barr and some focused advice we didn't have the sort of exchange of intelligence that we normally do.

On Monday the wind rose very strongly in the morning and many got wet and tired in the difficult condition. Craig Barr warned us that every day on Rutland is different and in the end Monday didn't add much to our total knowledge of the fishery. The evening meal at the Odd House was well received by all as usual and we actually had a full squad of 14 for the competition on Tuesday without having to fish Bill Jones as we had to last year (to devastatingly good effect).

On the day of the event, as usual, the Army and RAF dictated where to fish and our team started out using the techniques described by Craig Barr. After the first hour it was obvious that our team had reverted to type and were going back to favored methods. What was abundantly obviously was that both the Army and the RAF were exchanging information on lines and flies by previously understood codes and our people didn't have the range of lines to copy successful methods. In the end the RAF had 78 fish, the Army 61 and we had just 23; our worst showing for some years. Paul Vine, who was unable to attend any of the practice days, was our best rod at 4 fish for 8 lb 13½ oz. He was followed by Martin Lester-Hinchliffe, Mark Glass, Nick Tompkins, Chris Anderson, Spencer Gorton, Ed Smith, Neil McFarlane and Ed Cain in that order of success. Two who counted in our best 12 blanked so we really missed some of our stronger team members who were unable to make the event for operational reasons. I look forward to Al Mundy and Damien coming back into the fold next year.

Al Mundy will be taking over as Secretary next year and Damien will be running the AMFC matches. Oh well! Better luck next year.

We all had good times but learnt some painful lessons this year that we must use to change our approach in the future.

Chris Anderson ~ Game Secretary