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Tournament Anglers seem to love to travel as far as they can to their latest and greatest spot holding fish. We love to race at 70 plus mph to get the adrenaline pumping to start the day. It’s happened to all of us; found a group of fish on practice day only to get to the area on the morning of the tournament and nothing. What Happened? Did the fish go to another county overnight. Did they eat everything in site the day before. I think they are still there laughing at us.
One habit tournament anglers seem to all have in common is to head back to the launch site in some cases as much as an hour before weigh in and fish close to the boat ramp/weigh in area. Even if you arrived 10 minutes early we all do it.
How many times have you or someone you know talk about catching that last bass 2 minutes from the weigh in time. I have a friend of mine that recently caught a 8 lb bass not more than 100 yards from the launch site, it was the only fish he caught all day and won big fish for the tournament.
Why don’t we fish that close to weigh in site more often???
To show that this may not be fluke I am going to site 3 examples of why you should at a minimum consider spending some time at least practicing right at the weigh in site.
My most memorable experience was while fishing a tournament on the Toho and Kissimee chain of lakes in central Florida. The launch site was in lake Toho. Typically most anglers will run south to lake Kissimmee, it is about a 30-40 mile run. I had fish and a lot of them, pre-spawn and spawning fish in two different areas. I was confident I would have a good tournament.
It was a draw format tournament and I was the boater. The non-boating partner I drew insisted we fish in a canal not more than 2 minutes from the launch site. To avoid coming to blows I agreed to “stop by” his area prior to make the run south, I prayed nobody would be in my area by the time I arrived. I had fished the canal before prior to previous weigh-ins with no luck which even made matters worse.
I was armed with a flipping stick and a plastic crawfish rigged Texas style which was the preference for my area once we finally got there. We started out at the mouth of the canal and while I was fishing seriously my mind was on getting the hell out of there. I was flipping the grass along the edge of the canal bank and about 30 yards in I flipped my crawfish in a small pocket in some floating vegetation and before my bait hit the bottom my line was tight and already past the front of the boat before I could even set the hook!! After what seemed like an hour I landing my biggest fish to date; 11.2 lb’s. Needless to say we continued fishing the canal, we both caught a limit and culled several fish. Towards the end of the day other boats starting arriving, while the fish shut off at the end of the tournament time I ended up placing third and my partner placed 9th. The day worked out much better than I anticipated and I never did get to my area.
Another notable experience was during a local bass tournament trail end of year championship I was fishing. It was a wo day event on lake Okeechobee, out of Clewiston, Florida. I had practiced for two days prior to the tournament. Just prior to the tournament a cold front arrived. It was windy and the conditions were difficult to say the least. What area were holding fish were muddy and area areas of the lake were jsut impossible to get to or fish due to the wind.
I practiced late on the day before the tournament. The sun was setting and it was time to go. There is a set of locks which lead back to the boat ramp. There is a waterway intersection which includes a perimeter canal and a main waterway channel which intersect at the locks. I was sitting in front of the locks putting away my gear waiting for the tender to open the locks so I could get to the boat ramp.
All of a sudden at the intersecting corner of the waterway intersection a school of bass started exploding on a school of bait fish. Without really thinking about it I just kinda chuckled in amazement think about all of the time I had spent practicing for two days just to see a school of bait getting crashed right in front of me. My rods were already put away and I didn’t make a cast. About 2 minutes later it happened again. This time I saw what was a least a 3-4 lb bass play volleyball with a large bait fish. Needless to say I put down the trolling motor and grabbed a rod….
The next day armed with an arsenal of crankbaits, and lipless baits we ended up catching over 30 fish not more than 30 yards away from the locks that the tournament started from. Many of the fish were small schoolies however with enough experimenting with different baits and different areas of the channel we managed to cull a large enough stringer each day to place 6th in the tournament. If the weather conditions were not as bad as they were we most likely would not have placed as well. many anglers did not catch a thing and most could not fish where they wanted to. About two years later a major tournament was held out of the same area and a well known professional tournament Angler placed 2 nd in the same spot. Something to think about!
Another example is from a fellow bass fisherman. We were fishing a major 3 day event on the St. Johns River in Palatka, Florida. It was not a typicall Florida Winter tournament. A severe cold front rolled in prior to the event. Needless to say not many fish were caught. Some of the best anglers in the country were struggling to catch fish.
On the first day of the tournament my room mate weighed in one of the only limits of fish. He ended up winning the tournament as well as big fish on the last day of the event. Amazingly he did not burn over a gallon of gas through the 3 day event.
The St Johns River is a tidal body of water. Randy my room mate ended up fishing a group of docks about 50 yards away from the launch site. Apparently there was a 2 foot drop off at the dock. When the tide was flowing the fish would congregate at ambush points around the dock area waiting to attack bait fish as the tide moved them through. At slack tide and low tide the fish would congregate on the drop off. Simple enough!!
He stayed right there throughout the entire tournament. In fact on the 3rd day of the event he actually raised his outboard and removed the cover to make other anglers thing he was having problems, so know one would follow. He proceeded to run his trolling motor with his engine up to the docks and proceeded to catch another limit and bog bass at just over 5 lbs. I believe he was the only angler to limit all 3 days.
In summary we do not always have to travel and hour away to find fish. The fish do not care about where your tournament is lunched from. While in many cases there just may not be a good fishing area right at your launch site. If there is and there is a known area for the possibility of catching that last bass close to the ramp, check it out first thing in the morning you might be surprised what you find. The above examples, and I have more prove that it may not be a fluke. Also think about how many fish are released at the tournament launch site!! Do all these fish travel 50 miles back to where they were caught???
Think out of the Box!!
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