2011 Forrest Wood Cup

Jay Yelas – Day 3
Saturday, August 13, 2011

> Day 1: 5, 17-05
> Day 2: 2, 7-01
> Day 3: 3, 10-14
> Total = 10, 35-04 (11th)

I caught three today for 10 pounds, and I lost a couple. I had a chance for an 18-pound bag – I had a couple of 4-pounders bite a topwater, but they wouldn't take it.

I felt good about what I was doing – I felt I was doing the right thing. And I could have had a big bag today – I had a big bag the first day – but it always boils down to just one or two little incidents during the day. One or two big bites mean everything in these close tournaments. It didn't go my way, but I still had a good tournament.

Today I fished a topwater all day. I gave up on the brushpiles that I fished yesterday. I said heck, today I'll stick with topwater. It was a tough topwater bite. It's really flaky. It's hard to go back to the same spot and catch fish. That's why you see the inconsistent weights for the guys fishing topwater. If you're fishing topwater, you're subject to not catch much at all.

Jay Yelas – Day 2
Saturday, August 13, 2011

> Day 1: 5, 17-05
> Day 2: 2, 7-01 (7, 24-06)

I wish I knew what happened. Yesterday I was catching what I call rain fish. It was cloudy, windy, rainy. If it gets like that again I can catch them. But to win the Forrest Wood Cup you have to catch them no matter what the weather does.

I kept only two good fish today and boy, you really need to have five. I caught a 5-pounder on deep brush with a 10" Berkley Power worm, so I thought that's what I needed to do. I did that a lot the rest of the day but I only caught one other fish. I'm ready to go back shallow tomorrow and try something different.

I absolutely let an opportunity slip by. If I'd just caught 12 or 13 pounds I'd have a better chance. The good news is, I'm still just 6 pounds out of the lead and anybody can win. I just have to figure out how to catch them when it's sunny. It can be done, obviously.

Jay Yelas – Practice
Tuesday, August 9, 2011

I shook off a lot of fish in practice, so I don't know whether to get too excited or not at this point. I've gotten lots of bites, relatively speaking, because the fishing is tough overall. I've got a hunch that I should do fairly well – I've got three different patterns working, and that in its own right is a good thing for a 4-day tournament where you're going to have to cover lots of water.

I've got some deep fish and some shallow fish, so we'll see what happens. Like I said, I like my chances, but not having set the hook too often, I'm not sure about the quality. I intend to find that out on the first day. I've had some that've bit and then swam off slow and steady and firm, and those are almost always good ones.

The water's really hot – like 92 degrees. To me, it's fishing just like the '07 Cup. Of course, I bombed out in that one. I did the wrong thing and ran up the river. Like most everybody else, I know more about what to look for this time.

There's not as much grass as there was in '07, but there is some grass and there are good fish in the grass, but there just isn't enough of it to go around. There's also bream, deep fish, brushpiles and schooling fish. A lot of things are working, but nothing's really working great and it's going to boil down to who gets the right bites. You can do the right thing for 2 hours and not catch a keeper – that's how tough it is. It messes with your head.

You need to have enough water to move around and change up over the course of 4 days, and that aspect of it is good for a championship. You've also got the heat, and that makes it a grind. But that's also good for a championship – it isn't supposed to be easy.