The October monthly meeting was held as usual in the Marina Bar, and this time we had something extra – a virtual guest speaker! More later, first off we had to cover the usual monthly agenda. The Club Standings are as follows. You will see Ray Plomer enters the charts this month by winning the Inter Club Competition with a bull huss of 13lb 8z (112.2%), although that was for LFHA.

Fish Of The Month was hotly contested between the fans of Best Specimen and fans of Wow That’s A Good Catch For The Area. Dave Newnham won with a turbot of 5lb 11oz which was voted Most Notable, beating Mark Bank’s actual specimen bream. But that’s how it goes! Don’t feel too sorry for Mark, he won last month. Dave kindly donated his winnings to the Lifeboat Fund, as did Ray Plomer with his Inter-Club winnings of £22.50. It’s likely our charity fund will be divided between GAFIRS and RNLI as both are deserving local causes.

The club membership is growing and now stands at 63 members which is great to see. This means more funds for competitions, prizes and events. The Cod Pool is now 23 x £10 (£230) which means a winning cod would be worth £172.50 and at the present catch rate almost any cod caught could be in with a chance. Don’t forget the Cod Open is on 31st October with even more prizes possible.

Steve reminded us that winter meetings will start at 6:30pm because the bar will have to close at 8pm. We plan to have more guest talks over the next few months and we are open to suggestions – RNLI/boat safety is already on the list.

It’s getting cooler so if you haven’t got your SMAC hoodie yet, now is the time to order. Please send any catch photos to Neville for inclusion in the monthly Catch Reports. Also, if you buy anything from Amazon please go to the Amazon website from one of the links on the Boat-Angling/SMAC website because this adds funds towards running the site and makes no difference to the price you pay on Amazon.

Having finished the meeting early we then welcomed Liz Baugh, Lead Medic at Red Square Medical, who joined us by Zoom link to run a workshop on heart-related First Aid. Although a number of us had already attended some First Aid and CPR training, there is always something new to learn and despite having to address the room from a computer screen, Liz did an amazing job and helped us all to become more confident in helping with a cardiac arrest or heart attack.  Even Buster the dachshund was paying close attention. Then came the practical exercise! We used pillows, artistically decorated to represent a person. After the exercise and a Q&A session, we voted on the best CPR dummy design. Although the results were close, the winner was Frank Chatfield who won a Distillery Tour and Tasting, kindly donated by Portsmouth Distillery in Fort Cumberland.

For those that missed the meeting (or if anyone wants a two-minute summary), I still think Vinnie Jones’ video is one of the best. Here it is.

Next meeting will be Tuesday 1st November at 6:30pm in the Marina Bar