The Inside Line

Every summer the Bassmaster Elite Series heads north, and that means big waves and big smallmouth. It is a fun way to fish but it also takes additional preparation to make sure my boat and the gear I use to tackle those big bronzebacks give me the best possible chance at success. Here are a few things I do to make sure all of my equipment is ready for the big water.

New lakes are always exciting, but they can be equally intimidating. I knew virtually nothing about Lake Oahe in South Dakota, other than it was huge and full of smallmouth bass … or so was the claim.

Entering this event, my expectations were high. The Upper Mississippi is thick with vegetation and other forms of shallow cover, perfect for my style and approach. In fact, my first trip to LaCrosse was particularly rewarding. The frog bite was off the hook, and I finished well within the money.

After a three-month postponement, BASS was finally able to hold the Sabine River event at Orange, Texas. The river was now back within its banks and conditions were stable after weeks of flooding.

Site selection for this year’s Texas BASSfest event was Lake Travis — a beautiful, deep and clear reservoir near the city of Austin.

During the pre-spawn, my bait of choice is a jerkbait and during the post-spawn, I love to throw topwater. This is nothing out of the ordinary as just about every bass angler uses these techniques during those times of the year, but one thing I like to mix in during both of these periods is a soft plastic jerkbait like the Yamamoto D-Shad. I fish it as a complement to my hard jerkbaits and walking topwater baits.

I like Kentucky Lake, but my track record there is weak at best. It’s full of bass — nearly all species in fact — but it can be fickle at times. And it’s almost always due to fluctuations in water level.

After competing on Grand Lake O’ The Cherokees so many times before, I felt my chances were strong going into this event, especially since it was spring.

The lake offers plenty of prime spawning habitat; including pea gravel and chunk rock banks within protected pockets. Visual targets include laydowns, willows, docks, bridges and all forms of rock transitions.

I’m on bass boat number six, but Minn Kota number one. In fact, I’m old enough that my first boat had a Johnson 12/24 troller on the front of it, the one with the old dog-legged shaft on it.

For many years, the crew at TackleTour.com have been a guiding light for many of my tackle purchases. Because I’m not yet ready to get up close and personal with Robin Leach, I’ve managed to exercise a considerable amount of restraint.

Last week, competitive fishing experienced a first-of-its-kind occurrence when both major organizations had to shorten events.

In June of 1997, I fished an FLW Tour event on Minnesota’s Lake Minnetonka as a co-angler. I remember the event largely because I finished 14th, and after failing to catch my limit fish on Day Two I missed the top ten cut by less than a pound and a half. Had I made it, I would’ve gotten to weigh in the next day at the Mall of America, which would’ve been pretty cool -- how many people can say that they’ve weighed in their fish, then immediately hopped off the stage and bought an Orange Julius?

I left work Wednesday night pretty disgruntled, headed north to the Elite Series on the Upper Chesapeake with the intention to return to the job on Monday fully gruntled. I love the work that I do for B.A.S.S. and even the long days and occasionally crappy weather usually leave me recharged.

With two and half Elite Series tournaments left this year, everyone is still fishing for something – everything from the AOY, to requalifying to just plain pride. If the season were to end today, young Bradley Roy would be our AOY, and usual suspects like AMart, KVD, Skeet, Palaniuk, Swindle and Hackney would be in the Classic.

Last Sunday my wife and I both woke up at 4am. We got out of bed, brushed our teeth, applied sunscreen together, and then got into separate vehicles. We met at the convenience store, and then again at the boat ramp, where we got into separate Bass Cats and headed in opposite directions.

Here’s what I learned about guiding over the past weekend: The guide’s life is not for me.

The beauty of the internet is that it has democratized information, and of course this applies to the fishing industry. Whether you caught your first bluegill last week or you just cashed a second consecutive Bassmaster Classic check, you can learn in short order from a chair what took prior generations hundreds of hours on the water to figure out.