Entries from August 2007 ↓

It’s Monday morning. I’m back in Alabama after a hectic week in Arkansas. But to say it was worth it would be an understatement.

I enjoyed the heck out of my week at Lake Dardanelle, and I couldn’t be happier to win the tournament that honors Ray Scott. I’ve been a member of BASS since 1971, and I’m pretty sure all of us who have been around for a few years understand that this playground we’re competing on now is here because of the ideas and the work of Ray Scott.

Overall, I couldn’t be happier. It was a tough tournament. Challenging from start to finish. Below this you’ll find the button that kicks of about a five-minute audio blog. It goes into what I was doing the last part of the tournament. I hope you enjoy it.

Well, I’m heading into Day three at the Legends tournament, which is a Six hole format. It will be really different to have to move from hole to hole on a short time clock, but I’m really excited about the next two (hopefully) days of the Legends tournament.

Click on the audio button below to listen to my thoughts going into Day Three.

Pretty darn happy with my weigh-in on Day Two as you can see here:

Here is a good picture of the launch area for the Legends tournament, with the power plant cooling tower in the background:

The Bassmaster Legends. This is quite a challenge. You find out for sure that fishing is an athletic sport when you spend 12 hours on the water in about 100-degree weather. It gets rough, especially toward the end of the day.

I’m not too familiar with this lake, so I’m trying to work my way through this. This is the first day of the tournament and I had a decent day. I’m in 11th place.

I just finished up at the Potomac River. It was a fantastic tournament.

I know I mentioned in this blog how the practices were tough. Well, in the end it was one of those events you really appreciate. There was just not a lot to work with, but I was able to hold my place. I moved up every day and finished seventh. I’m pleased no end, having found so few fish in practice.

The reason I’m happy about that is that I maximized what I learned. I fished open-minded. I think I fished as well in the Potomac as I did in the Classic, and I won the Classic. But as far as doing my best, I think this was just as good.

I won the Classic because I was on more fish, but also because I remained calm, went through the event and opened myself up …The reason I say that is that I made adjustments every hour every day. I remained open-minded. Received intuition. We all have a natural intuition. And I honestly believe that when you fish, if you’ll just listen to that intuition you’ll do well. I call it listening to the fish. They’ll give you indicators. Listen and you get into a zone. Do the best with what you’ve got to work with. And that’s the way the Potomac went.

I guess that’s one of the things I wanted to talk about and take away from the Potomac event. I need to learn from this event.  In a lot of my Elite Series events I’ve pressed. I’ve pushed harder because of this league. I’ve bowed to that pressure. I go out and I want a tournament plan. I want to follow it.

But it just doesn’t always work that way.

Some of the top fishermen, they listen and bend. I watched Skeet Reece fish, and he won the tournament.  But he’s fished well all season. Ninety percent of the events he goes into, he has tremendous confidence and knows he’s going to catch them. He’s the best bass fisherman in the business right now.

Kevin VanDam is the same way.  Year in and year out, he does the same thing. And even at this level, I believe that’s what makes the difference in those top eight or ten guys. Event after event, some guys are in it. It’s not skill level, it’s mind level. These guys stay calm and open-minded, they don’t bow to pressure.

A couple of times I finished well this year, but I didn’t maximize my potential. It’s not a matter of where you finish. It’s a matter of taking what you have to work with and being calm. You maximize what you work with. I get myself in that position.

That’s what I’m going to strive to do more of. I’ve got two more events this year. One of them is the major at Darnenelle. My performance in the Majors has not been good. I haven’t focused. It’s been completely the opposite of what I had happen. Maybe I can to go Dardenelle next week, open my mind up and get the job done.

Ready to Launch on the Potomac.

I’ve been away from the blog for a few days, so I need to point out that my practices before this tournament, the Capitol Clash on the Potomac River, were awful. But I wasn’t alone. Almost everybody was complaining.

So I’ve been real surprised and happy at the way this tournament has gone so far. After the second day I’m in 21st place. That may not sound great, but trust me - I’ll take it.