ABA - day 2

I was a lot more confidant going into Big Marine than I was in Coon, but I was still bummed after my poor day one performance. I figured I had blown any chance for a good finish, but a fellow angler told me that a lot of guys who do well on day one seem to bomb on day two. Based on my previous high finishes on Big Marine, this gave me some hope of making a good comeback. I was going to put yesterday behind me, fish hard and try to make it back into the top five.

Day two started cloudy, foggy & humid with rain and possible storms predicted for the day. Since it had always been sunny during the previous tournaments, I was a little concerned that the fish on my spot would scatter. Also, after drawing boat #21 I was worried someone would get to the spot before me, knowing a lot of guys has seen me sitting there all day.

While waiting for take off, I decided I was going to the spot regardless if anyone was there or not. It is a small area and odds are no one would find the exact spot anyway, if someone was there I would get as close as possible and do my best.

Finally my number was called and I was off. Arriving at the spot, I was relieved to find no one on it. I grabbed my Kistler Helium 7 foot medium with a FlaMinn Lures 1/8 oz mushroom head and a 4" worm, lined up the boat and made my first cast.

Normally I would start catching fish immediately, but I went the first 1/2 hour with no bites. I started thinking I may be right and the fish scattered, so I started moving around and finally caught a 15 incher. I thought I had located the school but I didn't catch another fish there, so I kept working around the area. After working my way back to the original spot I finally connected with the school. First a 14 incher, I threw back and stuck a 16, then another 16. Then, on my next cast, I felt the bite, set the hook and broke off. I quickly retied and started casting again but the broken off fish seemed to shut down the school.

An hour went by without another bite, it was now raining, I was cold and frustrated and only had four fish. I was starting to wonder if I was going to catch my fifth fish when finally I hooked into one, after a nerve wracking battle I put a nice 17 incher in the livewell. Now I was excited, I had a limit and a very good start to another big bag, with plenty of time left to cull.

A short time later I hooked into what felt like another good fish. After carefully playing the fish to the boat I scooped up a fat 18 incher, which culled the 14 from earlier. The next fish felt better than any of the others, after a long battle I netted a 19 incher. This fish culled the 15 incher and put me around 15 - 16 lbs. At this point I could hardly believe it! 16 pounds is a monster bag for Big Marine, and I was thinking about culling 16 inch fish to increase my weight, knowing it was very possible.

Over the next couple hours I caught a few fish that didn't help, but with about a half hour left, I set the hook into another good fish, a 16+ that culled my smallest 16 incher. I was sure I had over 16 pounds now and didn't want to take any chances, so with about twenty minutes to go I wrapped up and headed in.

After all the boats were in I went up to watch the weigh in since it would be a while before I weighed. I heard lots of grumbling about tough fishing and small fish, which made me feel pretty good. I couldn't believe what I was seeing, lots of 5-7 pound bags and lots of 2&3 fish bags. When boats 16 - 21 were called to weigh, I bagged my fish and proudly walked to the scale. My big fish was 4.35 and my total weight for the day was 16.26lbs. I released my fish and watched the remainder of the weigh in with the closest bag to mine being in the 11lb range. When the weigh in was over I knew I had big fish for the day and made up some ground, but I had no idea where I was going to end up in the tournament or year end standings.

I waited with anticipation as the totals were calculated, and when it was all over I walked away with big bass for day two, 5th place for the tournament with a total weight of 21.54lbs, and 3rd place in the year end standings for a total of 825.00.

Although I was happy with the way I finished, it was somewhat bittersweet knowing if I had done better on Coon I would have placed even higher.