Cashing Checks

"The more I practice, the luckier I get. "

    

 

Last October I had two tournaments on Lake Martin, AL.  The first was a club tournament and the Second was the Bassmasters Federation State Championship, a two day tournament.  At this point I had to change my definition of “winning”, it wasn’t necessarily getting first place.  I had to look at winning as getting better over time, learning from every fish, every trip, every partner.  I looked at not catching fish as a positive, because it told me what not to do for a given set of circumstances.  When I broke something I learned how to fix it.  Everything was taken in stride and as long as I was learning by doing, I was moving forward.  I was feeling pretty good after winning the big fish night tournament on Lay Lake and coming in second by a quarter of a pound on Lake Guntersville.  I had accomplished two goals so far- 1) catch a limit in a tournament and 2) cash a check.  I had to keep it going and I wanted to win a tournament as a boater which I knew would happen in time and I also wanted to finish in the top six in my club.  I had no idea what to expect from the State Championship but wanted to have a good showing.  The club tournament two weeks before would give me an idea of what to expect from Lake Martin.

I was paired out with Mathew Hebert (nickname Shrek) who was a giant guy from Wisconsin.  He hadn’t done to well in the tournaments so far and I wasn’t sure how the trip would go.  After talking to him I was reassured at the very least we would have fun since he was such a nice guy.  Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to finish strong but fishing with someone who was not a jerk was also pretty high on my list.  To this day, I have never fished with anyone in any of these tournaments that I couldn’t get along with, but I have heard some horror stories.   This was also the first tournament that my partner asked if I had any spots I wanted to fish.  You are supposed to split the day and the front of the boat with your partner.  If you didn’t have any spots to go to or were unfamiliar with the lake you would generally give up this split and just sit your butt in the back of the boat.  Not sure why he wanted my input but I was happy to give him my 2 cents and tell him where I thought the fish should be.

      The weather had been cooling down and I thought the fish should have started making their migration back into the creeks from the main lake.  I wanted to fish secondary and main lake points and try to find some fish along the breaks of these points.  He thought that was an okay idea, then I saw some fish busting just outside of where we were launching on a secondary point.  After everyone blasted off, we idled over to the point and I started throwing a green pumpkin trick worm on a 3/16^th oz weight.  I quickly boated two keepers and Matthew kept chunking his crankbait to no avail.   We jumped a couple of points and I had two more and Mathew had started throw a worm too.  He had one small keeper and I had four that were barely over 12 inches. 

     We shot up river since we weren’t catching the fish we needed.  When we got to our new spot a couple of miles up river the outboard made a loud noise and we quickly found out all we had was a trolling motor.  Mathew said he always had engine trouble, which was nice to know since we were in the middle of a tournament.  We fished some rip rap near a point on the main river and I caught a decent 2 pound spotted bass on a watermelon  Berkley Dover Crawler.  I had five but couldn’t cull up.  We limped the boat all the way back to the ramp with the trolling motor and that took us the rest of the day.  With the blue bird skies and post front conditions the bite was really tough.  It only took 7.73 pounds to win, and my 6.16 was good enough for third.  Three tournaments in a row, three checks cashed.   

Takeaways:

·          Always carry your cell phone and make sure it’s charged!!!

·         Even on tough days fish will eat a finesse worm.

The State Championship was coming up in two weeks and I wanted to be prepared.  I broke down all my reels and cleaned them.  I also cleaned all the bearings in the reels.  To do this- take a small metal or glass container and put an inch or so of lighter fluid in it.  Heat up the lighter fluid so it is warm , I use a plug in stove top looking deal.  I have heard of people using a coffee brewer.  Once the fluid is warm drop your bearing in there for at least 30 minutes.  Dry them with a paper towel and then dip them in thinner.  The thinner will remove all of the residue and they will work like new.  Let them dry overnight and then lubricate them.  Make sure you don’t put to much oil on them.  One drop of Quantum Hot Sauce is what I use.  I have replaced a lot of my bearings with ceramic ABEC-7 bearings which require no maintenance, but it cost about $50 per reel to do this.  If you have a lot of the same reels it’s a little cheaper because you can buy bulk packs of 4 in each size.  They make a huge difference and  I get my bearings from Boca Bearings.  


 
Nice Largemouth practicing for State Championship -Lake Martin


 Good spot practicing for State Championship- Lake Martin

Lay it on the LINE!

     If you want to become a better fisherman you will have to learn the advantages and disadvantages of Fluorocarbon, Monofilament and Braid.  Spending time with each line type in different tests and from different brands with different applications also will be crucial in moving forward.  I fell into the trap of making bad line decisions based on a small number of outings with one brand of line.  I was extremely skeptical about the benefits of fluorocarbon and thought it was just another way the proverbial “they” got us to spend more money.  This was based on a few times I broke fish off on the hook set with an unnamed brands fluoro.  It wasn’t until I was fishing on lake Guntersville as a co-angler, when the light bulb went off.  My partner and I were both dragging 10 inch worms around isolated brush in 10 feet of water.  By chance I bought a spool of Seaguar Red Fluorocarbon and had spooled two reels.  He was using mono and I was out fishing him 3 to one out of the back of the boat.  He kept asking what I was doing different, and “I” wasn’t doing anything different, my line however was making all the difference.  I ended up an ounce or so out of first place and he was left with wondering how the guy in the back of the boat beat him.  He did introduce me to a scent called "Nitro Gravy"  that worked really well on Guntersville.  It stunk so bad my wife threw my clothes away- but back to the line conversation. 

     As someone who fishes a ton of soft plastics,  polyvinylidene fluoride or fluorocarbon has made an enormous improvement in my hook ups and the number of bites I get.  This is because it’s virtually invisible to bass, has less stretch than mono which improves sensitivity, doesn’t absorb water (which is what weakens mono), is abraision resistant, and is unaffected by UV rays ( which also weaken mono).  I have had a few issues with finding a knot that I like with it, but hopefully I will get that figured out soon.  A Palomar knot  crimps over on itself and will cause the line to weaken more than a cinch knot.  I like the Trilene knot but am still experimenting with this.

       I probably fish fluorocarbon 90% of the time and buy it bulk spools to make it affordable.  The only time I will not use it is with topwater baits and when fishing heavy  cover.  Monofilament is far superior with topwaters because fluorocarbon sinks and has little stretch.  That will  affect the action of most topwaters in a negative way and the lack of stretch will cause you to pull most visual baits away from the fish before they have a chance to get it.  When I’m fishing frogs or swim jigs in weeds or slop I opt for braid because it will cut through that stuff like a knife. 

Choosing a rod based on the line your using can also make a difference.  I don’t have very good luck using heavy action rods with fluoro for most soft plastic applications.  The heavy action seems to let the fish feel me before I feel him.  By using a medium heavy with a softer tip, I still have the backbone needed to drive the hook home and the fish will on to the bait longer because I will get a couple more seconds before they feel pressure.  With braid you may also want to scale down the action of your rod and really rely on your drag a little more.  Heavy action rods and drags that are tightened all the way down will cost you fish.  The drag should slip a little bit on the hookset with and I would loosen it even more once you get the fish  out of cover.  If the action is to stiff, you could rip a large hole in the fishes mouth or it could cause the knot to slip if your like me and have trouble lightening up you hook sets.  Neither of those things are good when your trying to get fish to the boat.

Softbaits- this needs it’s own category for me since it’s what I do most.

-Finesse/Shakey Head, Swim Jig Head- 8 pound Invizx

-Normal Bottom Draggin’- 15 Invizx

-Flipping Plastics in heavy cover- 25 pound test fluoro or 20-25 low stretch mono.  I like Trilene XT  if I use mono.  Fluoro is great but I cannot tone down my hook sets most of the time so the heavier mono has a little more shock absorption and I rarely flip more than 20 or 30 feet so I still get good hook sets.

-Carolina rig- 15 pound Invizx fluoro with a 10 pound fluoro leader

 Every Thing Else-

*Crabkbaits-  12 pound Yozuri Hybrid or 15 Invizx.  Yozuri Hybrid is a copolymer line which I really like and it’s tough as nails.  Copolymers are a blend of mono and fluorocarbon.  With shallow crankbaits I will use mono because it casts a little better and

*Spinnerbaits, Spoons- 15 fluoro

*Topwater- 12-17 mono depending on the size of the lure I’m using

*Jigs- swimming 50-65 braid, draggin 15 fluoro

*Frogs- slop-65 braid, Toads- 15 fluoro, braid in heavy cover

The number one tip for all lines is to go out and find out for yourself what you like with what you like doing.  

 Here's one of those I caught from the back of the boat.

How many colors do you need?

"The road to success is always under construction."


I was taking a little bit less tackle but was driving my own car so I could pack it with "just in case" stuff. It's normal to ride with your partner, but I didn't want to risk my partner getting upset that I brought so much crap. After work I would spend 2 or 3 days culling down what I thought I was going to use for the next tournament. I would take around 100 bags of different soft plastics for different situations, and my car would have another 500 bags or so. In the car, every different type of plastic was separated and labeled in large zip lock bags.

     There were a few occasions where I saw a slight variation make a big difference in the number of bites I got. One instance was on Lake Wheeler last June. In practice, I was fishing a Zoom Super Hog around shallow grass. I was getting bit early on green pumpkin/ blue flake. I only had one bag so I kept trying different colors and every other color I tried (Green Pumpkin, Pumpkin, Watermelon, Watermelon/red flake. was getting ignored. I was out catching my partner Sonny 3 to 1 with that Super Hog. I gave Sonny some Baby Brush Hogs in that same color and he started catching fish to. We probably caught 30 or 40 fish but could not find any bigger fish. We had dialed in the right color but we were fishing in the wrong area. After the tournament I did some research on crawfish in the Tennessee River and found out that after the spring, they lose a lot of their oranges and reds and have hues of blues and greys.

Did color make a big difference? Yes, but I didn't get the quality bites that I needed to place high in the tournament, so in the end it didn't matter. As time has gone on I have narrowed my choices down to just a few colors. I honestly think 90% of the time you could get away with 4 colors or so.


Here's my basic break down:

In trick worms, curly tail worms, senkos,craws,lizards, and creature baits- I use green pumpkin, black, and watermelon. Black is my go to color, if I don't have black, I'll use any dark color. I don't think it maters that much since I throw this in stained or dirty water and low light conditions. If it's bright outside and the wind is blowing depending on water clarity I will use either G.P. or Watermelon. Clear water watermelon gets the nod.  When in doubt, match the bottom color.

Grubs, Flukes, and Tubes - usually I am fishing these baits higher in the water column and trying to imitate shad or baitfish, so I use all of the colors above but add white and a minnow color. In flukes I really like Arkansas Shiner and in tubes I almost exclusively use Net Bait's BK tube in Lou's Special.

Frogs- White, black, Watermelon.


Swimbaits- White or any minnow color


Rules and Exceptions:

*Translucent baits: they work well in clear water because they are slightly camouflaged by taking on colors of their surroundings. Once the water has some color to it this camouflaging effect is a little to effective and an opaque color will create a better silhouette for bass to find.

*Glitter or flake: shiny flakes like red, blue or silver can make a positive impact in sunny weather if the fish are active but can scare them away if they are in a neutral mood. or if the water is to clear. The flake also can make the worm look more lifelike by reflecting light in all directions just like many baitfish. Black flake will make a bait look more lifelike in low light conditions, especially on the bottom.

*The colder the water, the more subtle you want the bait.

* I like baits with salt and scent in them and also use Smelly Jelly to make sure my scent isn't on the bait. Bass do not have the ability to smell oily scents. They do not possess the receptors necessary to take oil molecules and translate them into useful information. The molecules are to big. The great part is that by using an oily scent, you are able to completely mask any offensive smells. Water base scents like Berkley Gulp will fit their receptors but disperse so fast you would have to continuously apply it and fish a confined area for it to make a big difference.  The smelly jelly also helps the lure slide through cover.

*Shakey head worms- I will use red bug and also chartreuse as well as GP and watermelon. Spots love chartreuse and will usually start with that. Not sure why I like red bug but it seems to work under 10 feet. Deeper than that and red is almost invisible to bass

*I will use a white, pink or yellow trick worm for a top water presentations since it's more of a reaction bite.

* I will also use a white lizard if I am sight fishing since it's important for me to keep visual contact with the bait.

* Also the deeper your fishing the darker the worm I use, since the bait is just making a silhouette.

*With Spike-It Dyes you can make all the other combination's you need. I keep chartreuse, orange, blue, and red markers in the boat, but rarely use anything but chartreuse.

Emergency button!!!-If you can't get bit- throw a black or green pumpkin trick worm with a light weight (1/8th oz or lower). If you don't get bit with that you need to move.

I know it sounds like a lot but this just scratches the surface.

I found my mojo

"A winner is one who accepts his failures and mistakes, picks up the pieces, and continues striving to reach his goals."

~ Dexter Yager

      I had been willing to do things I didn't like to create something I did.  I had to practice to gain confidence, find what I was good at, and get great at it.  I wanted to have one technique and learn it inside out, something versitile that could be used year round.  For me that was soft plastics.  I wanted to know the best knots, best lines, colors ,conditions, hooks, weights, the list is really never ending.   It was really the only thing I knew I could do successfully, and the whole year I was shying away from it by trying to be like the person I was fishing with.

     Every tournament  I had been in up to this point would be considered a failure by most tournament anglers.  Approaching each outing with enthusiasm regaurdless of how I performed the week before was one of the keys that would start to lead to solid performances.  Just showing up and fishing was not going to put me in the money and more changes needed to be made.  I had made the decision that I would be a first rate version of my self instead of a second rate version of someone else.  My goal of cashing a check was about to be realized and it would give me the confidence I needed to become more proficient in my chosen technique.  I was chasing to many rabbits and couldn't catch any of them.  By having a laser focus on soft plastics, I could produce under almost any conditions, plus I was good at it.

   I had never been bass fishing in a tournament at night but that didn't stop me from entering a night tournament on Lay Lake.  It wasn't a big tournament, maybe 15 people or so, and a few of those people left because the weather was so bad for the first couple of hours.  The tournament started at 5:00 P.M. and ended at midnight.  It was a big fish tournament, paying out the biggest Largemouth and the biggest Spotted Bass.  I was excited since I had been paired with John again, and he cracked me up.  John had told me before hand to spool my reels with clear blue fluorescent line.  He had black lights all over his boat and the line looked like bright white rope with those things, even though they made his boat look like a spaceship.  We had went back to the dock after the first hour because it was raining like crazy.  After waiting out the lightning, John and I decided to go out and fish in the rain.  I was throwing a 10 inch Power Worm in Red Shad and John was throwing his trademarked spinnerbait.  Throwing a big bait was a decision I had to go with since it was a big fish tournament. It would only take one good bite. I caught a 3 pounder pretty quick and culled a couple more fish that were in between 3 and 4 pounds.  John had caught a couple of good Spots but we had no idea what it would take to win.  We were targeting points with willow grass on them and the fishing was pretty tough since a front just passed.

  John felt like we both had a good chance to get a check but it wouldn't be until the first few people started weighing in that I thought I had a real chance.  It seemed like every person that was coming in had no fish to weight in.  I knew it was tough, but no one had a largemouth over 2 pounds and I won the largemouth part of the tournament, John won big Spot.  I called Kelly, I posted it on Facebook, I called my parents, I was very proud.  All that time on the water was starting to pay off and how I would do in the coming weeks would let me know if it was a fluke or if I was actually getting better.

Lessons Learned:

1)  Do what you know!
2)  If you go night fishing bring a light.  John had to stop fishing to let me borrow his headlight about 50 times.

My largemouth was all head.

Lay lake crawfish

This is what the crawfish of on Lay Lake look like right now.  Green Pumpkin, red tips people.





 

The Zebra Jet

  I was set to fish a two day club tournament on the Alabama River.  My partner was Scott Holmes and I had never even talked to him before the tournament practices but I knew him by the boat he drove.  It was a zebra striped jet boat, it was hard for him to hide in a very conservative sport.  He fished the " Bassmaster Weekend Series" which is a step up from the Bassmaster Federation and right off the bat we got along by not getting along.  We would both make fun of the other person and he could not handle the fact that I brought 6 rods and a huge tackle bag, and he really didn't understand why I had two spinning setups.  When I would use a spinning rod, Scott could not concentrate on what he was doing.  He knew it was not the right tool for the job and he wouldn't shut up and fish until I used what I was supposed to.  The problem with the spinning outfits was the action was to light and I would not get a good hook set, he also thought they were very sissyfied.


     During practice Scott would jump from spot to spot until he found fish.  I had to learn that sitting around and fishing one area wasn't going to cut it if the fish weren't biting or the fish were small.  The first spot we got to was a little hump next to a island in the back of a creek.  We hadn't caught much in the first 15 minutes or so and Scott told me to put my life jacket on and we were moving.  When he was ready to go you should probably have your life life jacket on and be sitting down in 30 second or he would not be happy.  I had my life jacket on and then I saw some fish boiling behind the boat.  I told him, and he told me they were stripers  and he was getting pissed that I was casting when he was ready to go.  About that time I had a good spot blow up on a spook.  We stayed for an hour and caught spots that were chasing shad on top of that hump.  He had five in the first hour and I had 3.  I missed a bunch of fish and put on sure set trebles for the next day (only had two blow ups the second day but caught both with the sure sets on).  I was close to my goal of catching a limit but it took most of the day before I got my second two keepers.
   Scott acted like a jerk but really actually wanted to help, he just had a funny way of showing it.  He was culling fish on a Horny Toad and I was learning to fish it and he was supplying me with the baits.  I was getting pretty frustrated, I had a forth fish on a toad but I went for what seemed like hours without my 5th fish.  I threw a hissy fit and Scott gave me the rod he was using that had a lizard on it, gave me the front of the boat and said "here baby, catch your fish".  Two minutes later I did.  I was happy and I had found someone I really liked to fish with.

     I had a limit the second day and finished in the middle of the pack.  Scott won the tournament.  My first two club tournaments, my boaters won.  I felt more like a good luck charm than a good fisherman.   John and Scott both used braid a lot during those tournaments and both were power fisherman.  Of course I over compensated my next two tournaments and used all braid, heavy action rods and power fished when I should have slowed down and scaled my line back a little.

I was sick of this BS and had been making changes and contradicting myself.  I was making bad decisions and spent about 25 days on the water over the next two months to try and figure out what I was good at and had confidence in.

Lessons.

*Braid is good in heavy cover and dirty water, don't over power it with a heavy action rod.  You will rip holes in the fishes mouth. 

*The only thing I liked monofiliment for was topwater.  I was using it on presentations that required strong hook sets and with any length of line out, it would not do the job.  Fluorocarbon was what I really needed but I would not learn that until later.

*Tungsten weights were head and shoulders better than lead.  They are more expensive but worth the price, I found them online at half the price (Alley's Tungsten).  They are more sensitive and are half the size.  Larger lead weights can blow the fishes mouth open wider and make a good hook set more difficult.

*  I liked toads and learned they are really strong for fish guarding fry.  Creature baits like "sweet beavers" and "super hogs" were a great alternative to jigs (which I had no confidence in at the time).

Two footers and the new rig

99% of basketball games are won on lay ups.  The two footer is symbolic of doing the little things right.  Without being able to make that shot, not much else matters.  I was missing a lot of lay ups and had to figure it out.

     I had to rethink some of my goals after two sub par performances in my first two outings.  I just wanted to get 5 fish in a tournament at this point, a limit when the pressure was on.   I had way more to learn than I thought and it was not in the areas you might think.  Being around fish wasn’t the hard part, it was getting them on the hook and getting them in the boat that was difficult.  I spent a lot of time worrying about the right color and the right bait, which does mater, but when ounces make the difference in cashing a check and not- there are so many things you have to do right before even worrying about that.  At this point I wasn’t concerned about my rod actions, hook types, fall rates, knots, line type, drag settings, presentation, placement; the list of controllable things goes on. 

     What I was noticing is that not much separates the really good anglers from the average ones.  Putting a lot of these things together instinctually later in the year would allow me to start cashing some checks.  I was still throwing  what my boater was throwing if he was catching fish, and would not gain confidence in my own abilities for a few more tournaments, but I felt like I was progressing a little bit.  Moving forward meant excepting that I didn’t always know the right answer and that I wasn’t going to just start winning tournament.  It was going to take a lot of hard work.  Fishing had always been the most exciting thing in the world to me, getting better meant doing what others weren’t willing to do.  I had the right idea that I needed to do what my instincts told me to do, but I had not spent enough time on the water in the last 10 years to have good instincts.  It was going to take a lot of time on the water to gain the confidence I needed  to see for myself how all of those variables mattered in real world situations, not just in books .  I set out to find a boat. 

      I settled on a Pro Craft Super Pro 200 with a Mariner 225 horse power outboard.  I added some top of the line electronics and I was ready to rock.  More than anything anyone taught me during tournaments and practice, time on the water was where I really learned and progressed.  Lightbulbs were going off left and right throughout the last year and when I would see someone else have success during a tournament I could see where I had similar experiences and would tweak my approach with every little thing I saw.  I wasn’t putting the pieces together yet, but I could see them clearly.

 

I had to get rid of that little cuda fish finder and put on a Lowrance HDS 7, the seats look brand new in this picture.  I spent so much time in the boat over the last year that they need to be replaced now.

My First B.A.S.S. Federation Tournament

“the only time I say “no” is when they ask if I’ve had enough”

     After my stellar performance on Lake Jordan I was voted in to the club. I guess they thought I wasn't to much of a liability because they could not have been impressed my skills. I got knocked out in the first round of my last fight and got right back in the ring. I signed up to be a non boater in the B.A.S.S. 2009 Mercury Qualifier on Neely Henry, April 18th. Never fished there before, but to be honest I had really never fished most lakes in Alabama.

     The way these things work is there are way more people who want to be boaters than non boaters. So after they pair the non boaters, they pair boaters with other boaters. This causes problems because all the boater want to go where they want to go and they argue over who's boat to use, etc... The only way around this is if you pair with a non boater before the tournament on your application. It's called a guaranteed boater. You don't get to fish with that person during the tournament but you generally practice with them and split expenses, like hotels and fuel. A lot of guys will pair up for the year so they don't have to worry about finding a non boater for every federation tournament.

     Enough about how it works, here's what happened. Lee Byrd, a member in my club contacted me about pairing up. I agreed and we practiced a couple days before the tournament. Lee had a Gator Jet boat, which is basically a souped up flat boat with a jet engine on it. A couple people told me to be careful because Lee would drive in water that was 6 inches deep, he loved shallow water and had the right boat for the job. I caught some fish in practice but didn't learn much. Lee was focused on his game and would give me little pointers here and there. I was trying to impress him with everything I thought I knew.
   
     I got paired out with Victor Harper who was from Tuscaloosa and he was the nicest guy I ever met. He threw a Hilderbandt Spinnerbait most of the day and the bite was very slow. I had one small fish in the well that I caught swimming a jig and Victor had two. We had both caught more fish but they didn't measure. We were fishing a big shallow flat in the back of a creek, basically blind casting looking for dark spots which could be stumps. With an Hour left I caught one that went 4.68 lbs on a Master Blaster Spinnerbait . At the end of the day I had 6.30 lbs and qualified for the State Championship by .02 of an ounce.

     There wasn't much I learned during the tournament or practice because I was to cocky to ask questions. I kept telling Lee what we should be doing because I thought Jordan was a fluke and I still knew all I needed to know. It wasn't until after the tournament that I found out that Lee was the most accomplished fisherman in our club. He had stints as a professional and had fished in the Bassmaster Classic (the Super Bowl of fishing) before. Lee would go on to win the State championship later in the year and I wished I would have taken more time to ask him what he thought instead of telling him how I thought we could wack'em.

Lessons learned and to-do's:


1) You can't learn anything if you don't shut up.
2) I liked the hidden weight spinnerbaits, Strike Zone lures made
3) I needed to gain confidence in a technique and quit trying to match what the boater was doing.





The bass that qualified me.

Lake Jordan, Mean Spots, and Humility

"It's not what you don't know that gets you in trouble, it's what you know that ain't so."

It was Febuary 27^th, 2009- I didn’t sleep the night before and I met my partner John at 4:00 a.m. and the weather was turning sour. All of the warm rain over the past week had raised the water temperature and John was excited because that would turn the fish on. We stopped at Waffle House which is sort of a ritual to a lot of tournament fisherman. I knew John was going to be fun when he told the waitress the I would buy her a new set of teeth if she married me.

At the lake most boat had launched when the bottom fell out. I have never seen it rain so hard and they pushed back the tournament two hours. We launched right below the Dam and water was moving like the Colorado River. The water was up about 3 feet, it had been raining all week as well. Water was in peoples yards, all over the ramp parking lot, everywhere. So we get to our first spot and John starts wacking’em right away. He was throwing what looked like a Muskie Spinnerbait. It had a giant #7 Colorado blade, big chartreuse skirt and a trailer that was a chartreuse twin tail grub. It was so foreign to me. I was throwing a swim bait with a big paddle tail that dipped in Chartruese dye.

Looking back, I had no idea what to do in fast muddy water and John was spot on. Not sure why I loved swimbaits so much, I think it was because I threw them growing up and I could catch Bass, Redfish, Specks and everything else that swims with those suckers. John made fun of me a lot and even called me “swimbait” for a while. In fast muddy water you have to throw something that has a big bright thumping profile so the fish can find it. John was throwing a tank and those mean Coosa River Spots were choking it. He had 5 fish by 8:30 a.m., he helped me put together a spinnerbait like he was throwing and I threw that for a while but didn’t have any success.

I was asking questions non stop and John was focused in like a laser beam. “What should I be throwing John?”, “Not that Swimbait?”. He would say”Your going to have trouble with that line.” Apparently 12lb test monofilament was no match for these Spotted Bass, on his rods was 50 lb braid. Leaves and sticks were stacked up everywhere like mats of weeds and he kept saying “You can’t just throw it out there randomly,you have to make a good choice on every cast.” He had the fish dialed in and I just wanted one stinkin fish to save face.

The only time John was quiet was when I spilled chartreuse dye on his carpet. A lot of chartreuse dye at that. I also packed 100 pounds of tackle and a bunch of rods, which made moving around the boat difficult. After 15 minutes of silence and feeling like I just dropped a baby. John broke the silence with “Do you have any Grey dye you can spill to cover those stains?”

At the end of the day John had 13 lbs and was the only person to weight in 5 fish, he won. I goose egged, and learned I didn’t know as much as I thought. My job as the non boater was to go get the trailer so we could get the boat out of the water. I hadn’t backed up a trailer in 10 years. That was the most embarrassing part. After just about getting stuck, some local guy told me to get out of the truck and backed the trailer down. There were 100 people out there and none of them knew me but they all knew instantly that I was incompetent at backing up a truck and trailer. My world was turned upside down and I would over compensate the next couple of tournaments which didn’t really work either.

Lessons Learned and to do’s-

1) Don’t go to Waffle House with John.

2) Fast muddy water makes the Spotted Bass get up against the bank and you need something they can find to catch them.

3) I needed to carry a rain suit instead of a 100 pounds of tackle.

4) Light weight rods have limited applications in bass fishing.

5) You don’t need anything under 15lb test line in muddy water.

6) Don’t bring jars of dye in other peoples boats, I now carry markers made by Spike-It and they work just as well.

7) Swimbaits are not the most versatile lure in the world.

8) I needed practice backing up a trailer.

9) I needed way more time on the water and that was the only way I was going to get better. No amount of reading or TV shows were going to help me until I actually put the applications into practice.

10) I was good with a net, just put it in the water and let your partner bring the fish to you. Don't stab at the fish.

11) Try to figure out how the fish are relating to cover so you can make good decisions with every cast.

You can see how fast the water was moving 8 hours after the rain stopped. There was a ramp behind John, which was now covered up.

Big fish was a tie Chris Wiemar & Ryan Hermecz with Spots @ 4.49lbs