Team England Shore Ladies
FIPS-M 27th World Ladies Shore Angling Championship
Langebaan
South Africa (World Games)
8th – 15th February 2019
England Ladies Shore Team finish in 4th place in the World Championships
FIPS-M 27th World Ladies Shore Championship was held in Langebaan, South Africa from 8th – 15th February 2019 as part of the Sport Fishing World Games.
The England Ladies Team consisted of;
Heather Lindfield
Adele Smith
Kimberley Lawn
Becky Woods
Laura McConnell
Graham Woods (Team Captain)
Mark Hurcombe (Manager)
The England Ladies Shore team got off to a shaky start with Adele Smith feeling ill and getting medical supervision on the flight out. Luckily Adele soon got the all clear and she made a full recovery.
The practice week started very well with all the England team catching in good numbers.
Unfortunately, on the evening of the opening ceremony Adele became ill again with a sickness bug and the very next day was the official practice day so Adele still wasn’t well enough to take part.
Day 1 – Adele wasn’t still feeling her best but wanted to take part and the ladies gave it their best to finish 5th place overall with a great solid start.
Day 2 – Team England finish second on the day which had now moved them up to silver medal position which was a great result all round.
Day 3 – It was a hard-fought day for Team England who finished seventh, which meant they dropped to 5th place.
Final competition day – Team England dug deep and after a very hard day the ladies pulled back, but disappointingly just missed out on a bronze medal to finish in a well deserved fourth place just behind Croatia, with Spain as Champions and Portugal in second.
Top 4 team results;
1st Spain
2nd Portugal
3rd Croatia
4th England
Top 3 individual results;
1st Marina Mavrinac Matulja, Croatia
2nd Vanda Silva, Portugal
3rd Ana Diogo, Portugal
Mark Hurcombe, England Ladies Shore Team Manager stated “The team did their best in very testing conditions with temperatures in the high 30’s and very strong warm winds. All the Ladies finished in credible positions and Kimberley finished a fantastic 7th individually. Laura did amazingly for her very first England cap to finish 24th individual place.”
“As the ladies’ team manager, it was one of my proudest moments watching the girl’s gel as a team and I would like to say thank you to Sandra Johnson and Brian Owen of the Angling Trust for all their hard work behind the scenes and to all the people that helped with the team. I would also like to thank Graham Woods for all his help as team captain as it was a real pleasure to work with him.”
Thanks, and appreciation also for all the support and kind words that the general public gave us on social media and all the teams from around the World that made it such a great event.”
Next year will see the FIPS-M World Ladies Shore Championship take place in Minizan, France.