May 24, 2010 – bassmaster.com
EVANS, Ga. — The stars were perfectly aligned for Jason Williamson heading into the final day of the Pride of Georgia on Clarks Hill Lake.
His sisters performed the National Anthem prior to the weigh-in and the crowd was filled with family, friends and fishing buddies who he had smoked in years past at local tournaments. But the Wagener, S.C., rising pro couldn’t get the fish to bite.
Sunday, he made a long trek upriver to a spot that produced for him in the past both monetarily — he has won boats in numerous local tournaments relying on the area — and in piscatorial terms — he dredged up a 7-12 brute Saturday, the biggest bass of the tournament.
But the current wasn’t running on the sprawling reservoir and Williamson couldn’t buy a bite. Showing a veteran’s poise, Williamson dug deep into his vast local knowledge bank and decided to downsize from the Buckeye mop jig he primarily worked the first three days of competition. He tied on a shaky head worm and was able to scratch out a quick limit ultimately weighing 7 pounds, 10 ounces, upgrading his total to 53 pounds, 6 ounces.
2010 Pride of Georgia, Clarks Hill Lake Day Four
James OverstreetJason Williamson celebrates upon learning he held off Cliff Crochet by 2 ounces to win the Pride of Georgia.
It was enough, albeit barely, to best Elite rookie Cliff Crochet of Pierre Part, La., by 2 ounces and take home the $100,000 top prize
“Words can’t describe how it feels to win in front of these folks,” said Williamson, who jumped wildly in celebration when he results were finalized. “I won a lot of money from that spot but I just couldn’t get anything started today (Sunday). I wish I hadn’t run up there but I just had to go. I was regretting it all day.”
Fishing fans can catch all of the on-the-water action from the Pride of Georgia on The Bassmasters, which airs Sunday, June 6, at 10:30 a.m. ET on ESPN2.
Although the shaky worm rig carried the day Sunday, the Buckeye mop jig was the key to the victory. Saturday, Williamson built enough of a cushion — more than 4 pounds — that he was able to withstand a stumble. His 19 pounds, 2 ounces, Saturday was the biggest limit of the tournament and the 7-12 brute was the biggest bass caught this week.
With skyrocketing temperatures, Williamson knew that the north end of the lake would hold the bigger fish. He settled on his specific area because it was 5 degrees cooler than the rest of the reservoir. He was working flat points filled with rock and crawdads. The bass were still feeding on the tail end of the blueback herring spawn in those areas and were extremely active when current was being pulled.
A relative unknown when he first qualified for the Elite Series, Williamson is proving he is a force to be reckoned with. The victory is Williamson’s second in Elite competition and he also scored a second-place finish earlier this year on Smith Mountain Lake.
Jason Williamson
James OverstreetIn the boat, Williamson gives the fish a human’s-eye view.
“When I first qualified, things were really tough,” Williamson said. “I just didn’t have the experience. I definitely feel comfortable now. Experience is the most important thing that you can have out here. I feel like I can contend in every tournament now and that’s a good feeling.”
Still, it’s been a roller-coaster ride of a season for Williamson as he paired three missed cuts with his two stellar performances. His lack of consistency hasn’t hampered him too much, however. After this week, he is 24th in the Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year standings, and comfortably in position to qualify for the 2011 Bassmaster Classic.
Crochet was absolutely floored. The Elite rookie got his first taste of contention and he thought he had the victory. The Assumption Parish (La.) sherrif’s deputy worked a Spro bronzeye poppin’ frog in the shallows and exhibited the most consistency in the field over the course of four days.
He toted 11-11 to the scales Sunday and for a moment, it appeared all the hard work he had put in fishing tournaments at the Federation Nation and Bassmaster Open level had paid off. But ultimately, it wasn’t enough.
“That’s the nature of the beast,” said Crochet, who was still shaking minutes after the result had been decided. “I’m wrecked right now but if you look at the big picture, I’m fishing against the best in the world and I’m loving it.”
Crochet lost a fish that he estimated to be 2 to 3 pounds that would have put him over the top. The silver lining for Crochet is that he moved up to 36th in the Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year standings. That puts him on top of the Rookie of the Year standings and in the last qualifying position for the 2011 Classic with two regular-season tournaments remaining.
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5212832May 13, 2010 – bassmaster.com
Don’t look now, but Skeet Reese is having the best season of any BASS pro since Roland Martin in 1973. That was back in the day when Martin and Bill Dance traded off on who would win the Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year award. Reese and Kevin VanDam have those roles now. The two have taken each of the last three AOY titles.
With two wins, a second-place finish and two fifths in five tournaments, Reese is not only the favorite to win his second AOY title, he’s got the rest of the Elites fishing for second place. His lead in the AOY race is now 258 points, more than twice as large as any other angler has ever held in Elite competition. If he were to sit out the next tournament, he might still be leading the race at the end of it. At the very least, he’d be close.
This is exactly where Reese hoped — but could hardly have dreamed — to be at this point. He had a bad experience at last year’s postseason events. The AOY lead he took into the postseason disappeared when VanDam was awarded a bonus for winning a tournament during the season. And Reese’s chances for his second AOY vanished with a bad performance over two days at the Alabama River.
With three tournaments to go in the regular season, Reese has the other pros just about ready to concede the AOY title, and why not? He’s been amazingly consistent all year long. Even with the opportunity for new life in the postseason, Reese is head and shoulders above the rest right now.
So let’s look at the rest of the race — the fight to qualify for the postseason as one of the Toyota 12 and the battle for a berth in the 2011 Bassmaster Classic.
The only members of last year’s Toyota 12 currently in the top 12 are Reese (first), Cliff Pace (fifth) and Gary Klein (11th). The rest of the group is scattered between 14th (Michael Iaconelli) and 54th (Alton Jones).
With three to go, the lowest anyone has ever ranked and still finished in the top 12 is 36th place. That’s where Gerald Swindle was last year at this point and where Iaconelli was in 2008. They both finished strong. Swindle ended the 2009 regular season in 12th place, and Iaconelli was 10th in 2008. That’s encouraging for Swindle this year, too, since he’s currently 35th in the AOY rankings.
As for the anglers currently in the top dozen, we can anticipate that about eight of them will make it to Montgomery, Ala., and the postseason. The highest ranked angler to fall out of the top 12 after this point was Aaron Martens in 2009. He was fourth with three to go last year but dropped all the way to 16th. Iaconelli (currently 14th) and Martens (currently 15th) are two consistently high finishers who expect to move up in the last three events.
If 36th is as far back as anyone has come to get into the top 12, how far back can you be at this stage and still have a realistic chance to qualify for the 2011 Bassmaster Classic in New Orleans? Well, Mike Wurm climbed all the way from 62nd place with three tournaments to go to earn a Classic berth in 2007. A year later, Greg Hackney made it from 61st place.
Those, of course, are the exceptions. Historically, if you’re not in the top 50 or so by this point in the season, you’re going to play the role of spectator at the Classic. Right now, that’s about where perennial Classic qualifiers Boyd Duckett, Kelly Jordon, Davy Hite, Randy Howell, Terry Scroggins and Alton Jones find themselves. Tim Horton is further back at 62nd and all-time Classic great Rick Clunn is on the outside looking in in 82nd place.
May 10, 2010 – bassmaster.com
GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — Skeet Reese exuded calm Sunday morning heading into the final day of the Synergy Southern Challenge.
Perhaps it’s easy to be carefree when you are sitting on a pile of momentum — Reese had already notched one Elite victory this year and four consecutive top-5 finishes — but the Auburn, Calif., angler figured he had no shot of winning this tournament.
Reese’s best areas had diminished on Lake Guntersville and Davy Hite moved into the catbird seat Saturday with his second 27-plus pound limit and appeared poised to capture his seventh elusive BASS victory.
But Reese, who took home $100,000 with the victory, performed when it counted most — as he has all year — scoring his second Elite victory in five events and his fifth consecutive top 5, an unprecedented achievement in Elite competition.
If not for losing by a whisker on the California Delta — Reese lost by 1 ounce to Virginia’s John Crews — the 2007 Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year would have three Elite victories in five events.
As is, Reese has opened up a 258-point margin in the Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year standings. To illustrate the gap, Reese could finish in dead-last in two weeks on Clarks Hill Lake and his closest competitor, Edwin Evers, could win and Reese would still hold a 50-plus point lead. In Elite Series competition, Reese’s domination is entering uncharted territory but the carefree attitude still prevails.
Fishing fans can catch all of the on-the-water action from the Southern Challenge on The Bassmasters, which airs Sunday, May 16, at 10:30 a.m. ET on ESPN2 (re-airs Sunday, May 30, 11 a.m. ET).
“I can’t believe I won this thing,” Reese said of his sixth BASS victory. “I really didn’t think I had a chance. I was totally relaxed this morning without a worry in the world. I had no pressure and wasn’t even thinking about a victory. I would have been happy with 18 pounds.”
Instead, Reese caught 25 pounds, 15 ounces, blowing the tournament wide open with his four-day total of 100 pounds, 13 ounces, which accounted for the fourth time the 2009 Bassmaster Classic champion has crossed the 100-pound threshold in Elite competition.
After faltering Saturday, Reese said he would “punt” and scramble together a plan prior to his launch on Sunday morning. He stuck to his guns early and ran some of the same areas he had been fishing. He was spurred by an early good fish — more than 5 pounds — before he decided to move on.
Inadvertently, Hite contributed to Reese’s success. A skilled jig angler, Hite had built most of his total this week on the lure, and Reese was astutely aware. Knowing Hite’s success, Reese tied on one lone homemade mop jig, colored brown, and decided to work it around a bridge. He boated two 5-plus pounders, which upgraded his weight and effectively closed the competition.
Still, as most in the field, Reese primarily worked a crankbait — a Lucky Craft 3.5 DD — on main lake ledges for the majority of the four days. Key to the victory was Reese’s rods — the Wright & McGill brand that hold his namesake — which were designed strictly for long-distance casting with a crank.
“I almost feel like I’m going to get shot by one of these guys (Reese’s other competitors) if I keep this up,” said Reese, 40. “I always try to do something that hasn’t been done before so I’m going to keep putting the pressure on.”
While Reese stole the headlines from Hite, the two-time Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year was pleased with the fact that he put himself in contention. It has been a long dry spell for Hite — he had missed out on a top-10 finish dating back to last year — and though he faltered Sunday, the 1999 Bassmaster Classic champion did so to the hottest angler on the planet.
“A 5-pound margin (heading into the final day) just isn’t enough on Lake Guntersville,” Hite said. “Unfortunately, it wasn’t in the cards for me to catch them today, but at least I finished in second.”
Right behind Hite was Crews of Salem, Va., with 92-11. Though Reese bested Crews by more than 1 ounce, he was able to exact some measure of redemption this week for the close call on the California Delta.
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5175656May 8, 2010 – bassmaster.com
GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — Stiff winds and the threat of isolated storms greeted Bassmaster Elite Series anglers at the Day Three launch of the Synergy Southern Challenge on Lake Guntersville, but another threat out of the anglers’ hands might be more vexing.
“It’s Saturday, there’s 9 or 10 other tournaments going on,” said Skeet Reese, leading after two days with 53 pounds, 4 ounces.
Launch emcee Keith Alan was interviewing Reese and referred to the other 46 Elites as “pillagers,” just as another tournament launched within sight and boats scurried past the Elite launch docks at Lake Guntersville State Park.
“More like 400 other pillagers,” Reese said. “It you can manage to pull 25 today, I think that’d be a heck of a stringer. Then again, it’s Guntersville. Guys can bust 30 pounds. My goal is 25 or better, and if I can do that, hopefully it keeps me in contention and we’ll get to tomorrow and see what I can do.”
Second-place Davy Hite has high hopes. He weighed in Friday’s big bag at 27-0 for a 51-7 total and stands 1-7 behind Reese.
“I’m going to have to do the same thing today,” he said. “These winds are blowing a lot harder today than called for. Just have to adjust to that. The catches might be off a little bit. I just don’t know, but the wind is my main concern.
“This place is full of fish. It’s one of the best fisheries in the country. Bottom line is, we’re on Lake Guntersville and we’re going to have to catch a lot of fish.”
Other anglers down the standings like Jason Williamson, 31st, and Dennis Tietje, 32nd, are optimistic that the weather conditions could play in their favor and help them climb to fish another day.
“A bad day here is better than a good day anywhere else,” Williamson said. “The wind will be a factor, but there are three or four hundred other bass boats out there and it’s going to be crowded.
“The pressure is all in the weight and being able to get on your spots if the wind lays down might get better. My goal is to catch all I can.”
Tietje didn’t seem to mind the wind.
“It may keep some of the boat pressure off the holes and it may move the current better,” he said. “I don’t think it will hold it up and may even help some of us at the bottom. After Pickwick and staying in the middle of the lake all last week, I think this will be a breeze.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5173240May 8, 2010 – bassmaster.com
GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — Davy Hite knows what it’s like to be in the zone.
There was a time when Hite, a two-time Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year, was rewriting the BASS record books and consistently contending at tournaments. But the Ninety Six, S.C., veteran has had a tough go of it the past year, failing to notch a top-10 finish.
Conversely, Skeet Reese, dripping with mojo, has entered new territory, seeking his fifth consecutive top-five finish in Elite competition. And Reese was all set to take his second Elite victory in 2010 as he maintained a lead through the first two days on Lake Guntersville.
Until Hite, who toted 28 pounds, 6 ounces to the scales Saturday, threw a kink in Reese’s plans. Hite, the 1999 Bassmaster Classic champion, built his three-day total to 79 pounds, 10 ounces, good enough to take over the top position from the red-hot Reese at the Synergy Southern Challenge.
Buoyed by a 7-14 brute, Hite was able to register his second consecutive day of more than 27 pounds. With changing conditions on Guntersville — Saturday brought wind with no current — Hite has been able to keep pace by finding success with multiple patterns.
“This sport is just like any other sport,” said Hite, 44. “You get on a roll and you can’t explain it but you know when it’s happening. Everything gets easier.
“About six or seven years ago, I was able to string together wins consistently and for some reason, it stopped happening. It’s been a bit of a dry spell recently. So, it just feels great to be back in contention.”
Hite’s versatility included a finesse pattern mixed in with a crankbait, an obvious choice on Guntersville. He was less forthcoming with his other lure choices but said that he feels confident whatever the conditions present Sunday.
The windy conditions Saturday caused Hite to eliminate the finesse pattern from his arsenal and look to his other options. The crankbait proved key for the seven-time Bassmaster winner as it landed the 7-14.
While Hite lauded modern-day electronics, in the same breath, he said has been able to locate road beds using his own instincts. Some of these areas, Hite said, have made the difference and allowed him to pinpoint where the schooling bass are located.
“I’m just happy to be able to have a shot at winning one of these,” Hite said. “I’m not going to take it for granted this time. I’m going to enjoy every last second.”
While the windy conditions and lack of current didn’t affect Hite in the least, Reese, of Auburn, Calif., was left scrambling and settled for 21-10. Still, if not for a lost bass early in his day — one he estimated would have upped his total to 25 pounds — Reese would be connected with Hite.
But with Hite taking off, Reese is seemingly just hoping to hang on as most of his areas that were so productive for the first two days have been rendered ineffective due to the conditions. Thusly, he said he would “punt” Sunday and put together a different plan at launch.
“The fish just aren’t positioning like they were, and it’s really affecting me,” said Reese, the 2007 Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year. “That big one cost me right off the get-go. Clearly, there is something that is working out there. I just haven’t figured it out yet but I know a 30-pound bag is out there.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5173949May 7, 2010
GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — As Day Two of the Synergy Southern Challenge got underway Friday, the common sentiment was that the key for catching another good bag would be continued current and low pressure from local anglers.
With the number of recreational boats on the lake, the latter has been hard to come across, but Denny Brauer was fortunate to have one small spot all to himself on Day One.
“The key for me today will be not having locals sitting on my spot that were watching me yesterday,” Brauer said. “It’s a really tiny place and every fish I weighed in yesterday came off of it.”
While some of the anglers left their best spots after catching a good limit early, Brauer stayed and continued catching fish for most of the day. He culled up here and there to 24 pounds, 9 ounces and sits in ninth place.
“I don’t even know if they will still be there when I go back,” Brauer said. “But I’ve got four or five schools located within half a mile I can go to. Another angler is fishing one of them and he had a big bag, but I should have the other areas to myself.”
The current definitely helps make those areas better, and despite the heavy rains from last week, Brauer noticed they were not pulling as much water as they had during practice.
“If you were there when the current isn’t flowing, you are not catching them,” Brauer said. “Then the water started moving around 11:00 and lasted until around 2:00, which really surprised me because they have been running a lot more.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5170398May 6, 2010 – bassmaster.com
GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — Working through more than 200 bass and burning nearly 10,000 calories, Skeet Reese of Auburn, Calif., was looking for a frosty beverage and some empty calories to rejuvenate the senses after a scorching Thursday on Alabama’s Lake Guntersville.
And the 2007 Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year certainly deserves a mild celebration after toting 29 pounds, 3 ounces, to the scales, at the Synergy Southern Challenge, which put him in the familiar position at the top of the leaderboard.
This week, Reese is bidding for his fifth consecutive top 5 finish in Elite competition, which is unprecedented territory. But he will have to hold off two decorated veterans and fellow AOY winners Gary Klein (second) and Mark Davis (third) to accomplish that feat.
Perhaps the only thing that can steal the headlines from Reese is fish-factory Lake Guntersville. Guntersville is turning on at the opportune time, cranking out 40 limits that weighed more than 20 pounds. And if anyone knows how to take advantage of a primed Guntersville, it’s Reese, who scored a second-place finish here in 2009.
“I’m dog-tired right now,” said Reese, a five-time Bassmaster winner. “It’s an absolute grind. My hands are so shredded right now from catching fish, it’s crazy. It’s almost every cast. My first cast, literally, I caught a five-plus off the bat.”
If not for two lost brutes, Reese said his limit would have weighed more than 30 pounds, but all in all, he was pleased with his execution. He was keying in on schools of bass that he located in practice and was milking them until he felt it became counter-productive.
After practice, Reese — similar to many others in the field — felt that weights would be significantly down from last year’s slugfest on Guntersville. The 40-year-old was finding schools in practice but wasn’t exploiting the areas, instead saving them for competition. Initially, he thought 18 pounds a day would get an angler into the top-47 cut, but after his first cast, he knew he needed to change his mindset.
Amazingly, Reese is fishing all different areas than the ones he used to post the second-place last year. He still has some back-up water that he hasn’t visited but felt that his schools would regenerate and would concentrate on those areas first-thing Friday.
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5169269May 3, 2010 – bassmaster.com
FLORENCE, Ala. — Kevin Short saved his best for last.
Short of Mayflower, Ark., registered the biggest limit of the tournament Sunday — a 23-pound, 5-ounce, haul despite a reduced competition day — and trounced the rest of the field on way to his second Bassmaster Elite Series victory at the Alabama Charge on Pickwick Lake.
Cliff Pace of Petal, Miss., finished a distant second, more than 4 pounds behind.
With nasty weather looming, BASS officials shortened the competition day to five hours in order to escape the brunt of the inclement weather. While some competitors who were making longer runs were adversely affected, Short, who totaled 75-1 over four days, adapted to the parameters and boated the vast majority of his weight less than two hours into the day, effectively ending the tournament.
A frustrating start to the season — mainly due to the style of fishing that the venues have called for — is now in Short’s rearview mirror. Short cut his teeth on the Arkansas River and this week used much of his experiences there to feel his way out on Pickwick. The back-to-basics approach paid off to the tune of $100,000.
“I kept telling myself throughout the week just to think of Pickwick like a river,” said Short, who took his first Elite victory on the Mississippi River. “I was discouraged after Saturday because I just couldn’t figure out how to get them to bite. But I landed my biggest fish early today (Sunday) and I knew it would be my day then.”
Fishing fans can catch all the on-the-water action from the four-day event on The Bassmasters, which airs Sunday, May 9, at 9 a.m. ET on ESPN2 (re-airs Sunday, May 23, at 10 a.m. ET on ESPN2).
Short caught all of his fish on a Pepper’s Baits WEC crankbait, switching the colors from chartreuse classic when it was sunny to chartreuse black when it was cloudy. The balsa-based square-billed crank is in the same family of lures as the bait Short rode to victory on the Mississippi. The one-time Bassmaster Classic qualifier found the area which produced the majority of his winning catch on the first day of competition.
The 48-year-old found a creek, which produced all of his winning catch, on Thursday morning and preceded to catching cruising males. With a flurry of activity, he knew that the larger females had to be close behind. As he expanded on his area, he moved to the back of the creek and found a bevy of cover, including clumps of cypress tress mixed in with singular cypress trees.
On Sunday, Short’s early bass — a 6-12 brute — came off a singular tree, which prompted Short to strictly key on that cover the rest of the day.
“You couldn’t ask for a better area, it had everything,” Short said. “Trees, habitat, you name it. I knew the fish to win were in there, it was just a matter of me remaining patient and finding a way to catch them.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5155892May 2, 2010 – bassmaster.com
FLORENCE, Ala. — With just over four pounds separating the top 12 anglers in the Alabama Charge, it seemed like every angler had a legitimate shot at victory going into the final competition day on Pickwick Lake.
Now it’s even more wide open.
Bassmaster Elite Series tournament officials announced Sunday morning that the final day of fishing will be cut short by about four hours. Tournament director Trip Weldon informed anglers of the decision just a few minutes before take-off, saying a forecast for severe weather led officials to shorten the last day of competition. Anglers took off at 6:10 a.m. Sunday, and they’ll check in for the final weigh-in at Florence’s McFarland Park at 11:15 a.m.
It’s the first time in Elite Series history that a final day has been cut short.
The weather system that has spawned deadly tornadoes and flooding in Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee over the past 36 hours is moving east toward northwest Alabama. Forecasts call for chances of severe thunderstorms, including some capable of producing tornadoes, to increase throughout the morning hours. Doppler radar indicated a strong line of storms approaching Pickwick Lake this morning.
“The chances of severe weather go up after 11 a.m.,” Weldon said, addressing the top 12 anglers on the dock just prior to take-off.
Anglers had mixed reactions to the decision, some lamenting it and others celebrating it. Tournament leader Skeet Reese, who has been locking through to Wilson Lake all week, had the strongest reaction.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Reese said as Weldon made the announcement. “That’s ridiculous, Trip.”
Reese’s response is understandable. He’s the only angler in the top 12 who has been locking through to Wilson Lake, a process that requires about 45 minutes going into Wilson and another 45 minutes coming back into Pickwick. If Reese decides to go to Wilson this morning, he’ll have just 3 1/2 hours to fish.
“I don’t think you want my words right now,” Reese said. “I have no friggin’ idea what I’m doing yet. This pretty much screws my whole day up. It’s not looking good right now. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’ll make the decision in the next 20 or 30 minutes.”
Most of the anglers chasing Reese from farther down the leaderboard viewed the abbreviated fishing day in a more positive light.
“It’s going to make it interesting,” seventh-place Dean Rojas said, smiling widely as he prepared to pull away from the boat dock. “Real interesting.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5155613April 30, 2010 – bassmaster.com
FLORENCE, Ala. — Alabama and the Bassmaster Tour have a long and interwoven history. The Yellowhammer State is the birthplace of BASS, more Bassmaster tournaments have been held here than any other state, and Alabama is home to numerous anglers on the Bassmaster Elite Series.
So it’s no surprise to find anglers such as Aaron Martens and Steve Kennedy in the top five following Day Two of the Alabama Charge on Pickwick Lake. Martens, a native Californian who has lived in Leeds, Ala., for the past several years, is in third place, and Kennedy, who hails from Auburn, Ala., is fifth.
Other notable Alabama pros to make Friday’s cut to the top 50 anglers were Boyd Duckett, 21st (Demopolis, Ala.); Derek Remitz, 25th (Grant, Ala.); Russ Lane, 31st (Prattville, Ala.); Greg Vinson, 43rd (Wetumpka, Ala.); and Randy Howell, 49th (Springville, Ala.).
But Pickwick wasn’t as kind to some other notable Alabama pros, including Tim Horton, Matt Herren, Gerald Swindle and Kotaro Kiriyama.
Pickwick was an equal-opportunity butt-kicker. Other notable Elite Series pros to miss Friday’s cut included reigning Angler of the Year and three-time Bassmaster Classic champion Kevin VanDam (57th), 2008 Classic champ Alton Jones (78th), 1999 Classic winner Davy Hite (79th), and four-time Classic winner Rick Clunn (88th).
Of the ‘Bama pros, Horton was closest to the cut line in 53rd.
“It’s just been a tough week,” said Horton, who lives in Muscle Shoals, just across the Tennessee River (Pickwick is an impoundment of the Tennessee River) from the Alabama Charge weigh-in site at McFarland Park in Florence. “The whole deal is getting a four- or five-pound bite. I caught 100 fish yesterday and 100 fish today. Just not the right ones.”
Horton said he felt good about the areas he fished, and why shouldn’t he? He fished not far from the area where tournament leader Kevin Short pounded big stringers the first two days.
“I know I’m around them,” Horton said. “But I just didn’t get the big bites.”
Off-the-water matters have made the past week an emotional one for Horton, which might explain his on-the-water troubles. Horton’s grandfather suffered a massive heart attack nine days ago, and he remains hospitalized in critical condition.
In professional fishing, any loss of focus can mean a bad day or a bad tournament, and Horton admitted his mind has drifted from angling to his ailing grandfather this week.
“It’s a tough deal,” he said. “You try to close it out and concentrate on fishing, but it constantly pops into your mind.”
Despite the disappointment of not performing well in front of the hometown fishing fans, Horton said being close to home has been a blessing considering his grandfather’s condition.
“I can be thankful we were fishing here this week,” Horton said. “At least I can go check on him and be close.”
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/elite/news/story?id=5152881