Coventry’s Phil Smith with his latest specimen Barbel – this time from the River Swale in Yorkshire. You just can’t keep him down in 2012!  Incredibly, this is the 23rd different river from which Phil has taken a Barbel of 10lb or more – probably a record which will comfortably, never be emulated or equalled.  Phil has already taken doubles from the Dove, Severn and Soar this season – and has a couple of other tricky little rivers on his schedule; who’d bet against him taking his rivers tally to 25 before the Winter?

Phil took the 12lb 2oz beauty from a day ticket stretch of the Swale, succeeding with a 10mm Ellips Pellet hookbait superglued to a hair on a size 8 Drennan Continental Boilie hook – which was tested to the limit to keep the fish out of a major tree snag on the opposite bank!  Phil uses a Drennan Specialist Barbel 12ft 1.75lb rod, on this occasion with 12lb mainline.

For full details on the Drennan Continental Boilie hook, click here.