Day 1
At the pre-tournament meeting the night before the event I drew boat 78 out of 82 for day 1 of the tournament. I actually didn't even mind being so far back in the pack because I knew I would have at least an extra hour of fishing time over the boats in earlier flights. For some reason I also had a feeling that the areas I wanted to fish would not be getting a lot of fishing pressure anyways. I was right as I pulled into my first spot and there was nobody on it. My starting area was a deep weed line on the inside turn of a point. Almost immediately I started catching fish but the size was not what I was expecting. I was able to put a limit in the boat in about 45 minutes although only one of the bass was over 2 lbs. Those came on black/blue Chigger Craws and hematoma Sweet Beavers that I Tx-rigged with a 3/8 oz. weight. Even though the fish were small I was happy to have a limit so early and I knew I had a long day ahead of me so there was plenty of time to upgrade.
After the action slowed on my deep spot I moved up to some nearby docks just to check if the better fished had moved up there for some reason even though it was early in the day and pretty cloudy. I was only able to catch one fish on a 3/8 oz. watermelon jig but it was around 2 lbs so I was able to get rid of one that was barely 12 inches. At that point I went back deep to check some of the other spots I had found in practice but none of them produced even a single bite.
With my deep stuff failing me I moved to another stretch of docks and as I was swimming my jig between some of them I got bite off by what was probably a big muskie. Instead of retying I picked up a rod rigged with a green pumpkin Bleeding Bait Tube and for some reason that's what they really seemed to want. I started catching fish under basically every dock I fished. They were still small but every couple docks or so I would get one that went around 2 lbs that allowed me to upgrade. I just had a feeling that eventually I was going to run into a big bite or two. Sure enough I got one about 4 lbs to bite and I got her clear from the boat it was under but for some reason it just pulled free. That was a heart breaker but at least I knew there were some quality fish still around. To make a long story short I never got another good bite the rest of the day and was pretty disappointed as I headed back to the weigh-in.
My 5 fish limit on day 1 ended up weighing 11.19 lbs which was actually a little more than I expected to have but still nowhere near enough to be at the top of the leader board. I believe my weight for the day put me in 36th place. The leading weights were close to 18 lbs and the top 12 cut line was about 13.75 lbs. The big one I lost would have put me right near that cut line but there was nothing that could be done about it at that point. Even though I was back in the pack a little ways I still wasn't out of it so that was good at least. I knew I would have to catch them the next day though.
Day 2
On day 2 I was boat 5 so I knew I would be able to get any spot I wanted to start on. I decided to start in the same spot as day 1 even though the fish were smaller than I was expecting. I knew from practice that there were good ones in the area though and even if all I caught were little ones again it would be good to get a quick limit. Right off the bat my partner lost one at the boat that was around 2 1/2 lbs so I was encouraged that some better fish may have moved back. My first couple of fish were all small though but eventually got a few in the 2 1/2 to 3 lb range. I ended up working the same spot for a couple of hours in the morning just fishing as slowly as I possibly could.
After the action really slowed on my starting area I back to the docks where I had lost the big one the day before. I was hoping the same fish would bite again or that some other big fish had moved under the docks. That was not the case at all though as the dock bite was completely dead. I was only able to manage one small keeper that didn't even help me. Even though I had caught a lot of fish the day before I really hadn't fished the docks very hard so I was expecting to catch a few fish at least but it just didn't happen.
I moved back out to try a few other weed line areas but they weren't working either and eventually moved back to my starting spot. I was able to pick up another fish in the 2 1/2 lb range this time before the action died. At this point I didn't have much else going but my partner wanted to try some areas that he had fished in the past. Even though he didn't get any time to practice they were areas that he had caught fish on at the same time of year. As soon as we pulled up on one of his weed lines I put another 3 lb fish in the boat. A short while later I caught another 2 1/2 lb fish. At this point I knew I had a really solid bag but I was just missing that one big kicker. I kept fishing hard for the last hour of the day but never got any more action. All of the fish I caught on day 2 came on the hematoma Sweet Beaver. Like day 1 I was pretty disappointed as I headed back to the weigh-in site. I knew if I had that big fish from the first day I would be in but as it was I just knew I was going to be short of the top 12 cut line.
I was one of the first boats to weigh and my 5 fish limit went 14.11 lbs. That gave me a 2 day total of 25.30 lbs. The whole week I was expecting the top 12 line to be 26 lbs and I didn't get there. As the rest of the field weighed in though it became apparent that the fishing was extremely tough on day 2 and the bags coming in were very small for the most part. I was shocked when my 14.11 lbs ended up being the 2nd biggest bag of the day and was enough to give me a final finish of 7th place out of about 165 anglers. With this top 12 finish I have now qualified for 3 consecutive Northern Divisionals after finishing 2nd and 3rd the previous 2 years. I would sure like to win one of these things but I won't complain too much!
