Practice Day 3:
On the third day of practice I had paired up with my partned for the official tournament and we got off to a good start when he landed a 3.5lb largemouth early in the day (oddly enough it was caught on the main lake, a place where no one was catching largemough). We quickly headed out of that area and began heading to the south end of the lake. It was once again windy which meant that you better be wearing your rain gear if your making the treck across the wind swept lake. The high temp for the day was 40 with on and off rain. I personally didn't think the fishing would be that great but we ended up getting three more fish for the day; one smallmouth and 2 largies. After this practice I knew exactly what I wanted to do during the tournament day and I was the most confident I had ever been going into a college based tournament.
The Pattern:
Alright, now that the tournament is over I will spill the info in terms of how we were catching them... First of all we were dealing with 44-49 degree water temperatures, not very warm to say the least. On the south end of the lake there were boat and marina channels. These areas held the warmest water temperature on the lake and also held the best bet for catching largemouth. I was catching them in the channels on spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, crankbaits, jigs, and a dropshot. On the main lake you were looking at 44-46 degree water and the main fish were smallmouth. I caught all the smallmouth on jerkbaits (x-rap and strike king wild shiner) in 4-7 feet of water wherever there was rock. A wind swept bank also helped.
The Tournament:
This is the hard part about keeping this blog up...writing about things you don't really want to write about. To start off, we ended up doing terrible. Our entire Iowa Team consisting of 10 guys accumulated 2 fish (thats not a typo). 2 fish! I stuck to my guns on tournament day and it just didn't pan out. It was the coldest weather I had ever fished in (high of 38) with snow flurries every now and then. The wind had shifted to coming from the north instead of the SW like the other days. I could sit here and complain some more, but we just didn't catch them, theres no excuse for it because some other teams caught fish.
The only thing I would have changed in this tournament is getting a faster boat. Some people beleive that the boat doesn't matter in fishing, the fish don't care, and most times (almost always) it doesn't, but for this tournament it did. When you have small channels where all the fish are biting, more than one boat is going to go there (how about at least 20 of the 30 some boats in the tournament). I got passed by boats going to the channels and literaly watched other boats catch fish right in from of me for the first hour of the tournament. I fished behind them and finally picked up one 13 inch fish on a drop shot with 6lb flourocarbon, not a keeper though. In the channels on the first practice day I caught 5 five, 4 of which would have kept. So I know I would have been able to catch the fish had I been there first, but thats just how it goes sometimes.
I have no excuse for the smallies. I just didn't catch them. We tried adjusting and fishing windy banks, but I think with the wind coming from the North instead of the Southwest it changed things up and we just couldn't get bit on the main lake. I beleive that I am officially cursed in college based tournaments. 3 big college tournaments and I have yet to weigh in a fish. I have zeroed 4 times ever in tournaments, 3 of them in college tournaments. However, I still got to fish for 4 days straight and had a real fun time in practice attempting to break down a new lake. It sure beat being in class and its always good to be humbled every now and then, I just hope the trend doesn't continue during the next college tournament.
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