I have been asked by the chairman to put a few words together as a way of introducing myself as this year’s champion.

I have been fly fishing for 34 years and competing in competitions on/off for 27years. Initially I started off on rivers around the city then move into stillwaters and lochstyle disciplines all over Scotland, I then decided to try and make it vocational by attaining a HND in fish farming and fisheries management. It’s always been a constant in my life and always will, I find it just gives me time to relax and hit the reset button on whatever’s happening in life at that time. On leaving the Scots Guards and moving back home to Edinburgh I managed to get a job in the Orvis store and started learning more about teaching casting and fly line characteristics, the tackle industry in general. This is where I met my now good friend Stewart, his company Alba game fishing is an Orvis endorsed guide service and after fishing a couple of times with him, he asked if I wanted to start guiding for him, obviously I bit his arm off and now 10 years down the line and too many guests to count, I still look forward to doing it for many years to come.

Fishing is a leveller, people from all walks of life are there for whatever personal reasons, exchanging stories with people from different walks of life I find fascinating but what it boils down to is enjoyment.

Personally I love river fishing as it takes me back to when I started out and reminiscing of lessons learned from my late great uncle who taught me. Putting all these years of success and more importantly failure into practice to catch a wild fish is the pinnacle in my opinion.

The enjoyment I get from lochstyle is almost equally as good, the banter and camaraderie associated with the veterans team is second to none, inject a little competitive element and you have a day that’s hard to beat.

As a guide I have the privilege and opportunity to get my hands on kit from industry leaders in the hope that clients like the equipment I lent them, so much so that they go to buy it themselves. I am affiliated with Orvis, Fishpond, Farbank(sage,reddington,Rio) and Patagonia.

My most memorable moment on a days fishing was on the Annan about 6 years ago, I had Hooked and snapped off on a big brown trout, few minutes later and once I had given myself a good talking too and replace the fly. I cast into the run again and hooked into another fish, on netting the fish to my delight, noticed on taking the fly out, another fly was in its mouth…. Yes the fly I had just lost ….result.

I have been lucky enough to get to the national final on a couple of occasions however never made the team, this is something I hope to achieve in the near future.

Winning the veterans cup this year was an amazing personal achievement of mine and very proud to have done so in such a strong field of anglers.

I hope to start strong again next season and look forward to sharing a boat with you soon.

For now we switch targets to small stillwaters and the struggle to staying warm in the winter league.

Tight lines to all.