Since becoming a competitive angler in 2005 (under FIPS
regulations), Gilbert has attended 15 x South Africa National Carp
Angling Championships, taken part in 12 National Trials, won the
SA Championships once, achieved Silver three times, Bronze twice
and been part of the Protea Team who’ve won a record five World
Championship titles. He has also won the National Carp Trials five
times and placed second on four occasions.
When mapping became available to anglers, Gilbert and his fishing
partner were delighted. They’d realised that Carp and Bass like the
same kind of structure and it made sense to map whole areas - and
mark silt levels and where all the structures are. “Having maps with
a sharing feature became essential – especially in building up an
accurate database.” He said.
It was during the prep for the recent World Fishing Games that the true
value of this feature was highlighted. “As the Carp championships
were being held at Bloemhof Dam, one of my friends used his Elite
9 Ti unit to map the whole area (which was allowed up to two weeks
before the competition) – giving us lots of information such as the
thickness of the silt and structure along the bank and beyond. We
found lots of small rocks in the area, which meant we could be more
strategic – so when it got windy, we knew to keep our lines as high
up as possible to avoid snagging them.
We also realised that Section A the least silt and could be found in
the channel at 97m, (SA ended 1st), Section B’s area of least silt was
110m from the bank (SA-1st) and Section C was very shallow (SA
came 3rd in this area)
This helped our National team successfully target the right areas to
become the Championship winners with golds in both the team and
pairs results and a silver in pairs.
Having seen first-hand the features and benefits of Lowrance’s Elite
Ti units Gilbert needed no convincing to get his own unit – and no
doubt he will continue to make history with Lowrance!