Forrest Wood Cup

Practice Recap
Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Luke Clausen
It hasn't been real good. It's been a grind. I've tried a lot of different things over the last the 3 days and haven't caught any quality fish. You can't catch anything to get a clue on where to go with it. You don't get the bites to make you think there are some better ones around here. I'm probably going into the tournament thinking I'm going to fish new stuff. I don't really want to go back to where I've been and caught little ones. You're going to have to catch better ones here. It doesn't really matter who gets second. You want to try to win. I'm still going to try to figure it out. Luckily, we'll have some long days. Hopefully, things will change and something materializes that I can figure out as it goes on.

I've looked at pools 4 and 5 and there's a longshot that I may go to pool 3 blind. It's a long way, but at this point I have nothing to lose.

It seems like they bite better before 11 and I think a lot of that is the water temperature rising around that time. I've caught them in the afternoon, too. A lot of it is being around them, but they definitely bite a little better. We have this cold front – for here, at least – and it's getting cooler and overcast. The water's not going to heat up to what it had been earlier in the week. We might see the bite maintain a little bit throughout the day because of that.

Jay Yelas
My practice was fruitful. I was able to find some fish this week that I didn't know about so in that regard practice was beneficial. I'm looking forward to it. I think I can be right there and do well in the tournament. I think the first day will be pretty important. I think you'll see the biggest stringers of the week Thursday and as people go around and fish the same stuff over and over again, the stringers will decline as the week progresses. There are enough people who've spent enough time here that I think everybody will be on their best stuff tomorrow morning. A lot of tournaments we fish, guys figured them out as the week progresses or the first are in transition and the guys find where they're moving to during the week. It's the middle of summer here and the fish are in the same places they've been since July 1 when I first stopped here.

So many guys spent so much time here that I think all of the good spots are known and guys are going to exploit them on day 1 and it's going to be a tournament where you're going to want to get off to a good start and just catch enough to hang on as the week progresses. That's how I see it playing out.

I'm thinking someone will catch a bag between 14 and 16 pounds and after that, if you can catch 11 or 12 a day, that should be enough to win the tournament. I don't see it take it 60 pounds. I'd be shocked. Someone would have to catch a couple 7-pounders. It should be very close and be exciting for the fans. It could come down to ounces on the last day.

Day 1 Practice
Sunday, August 11, 2013

Jay Yelas
I saw water today that was 96 degrees. I think I've only seen it that hot once before, somewhere in Alabama. I think a Jacuzzi is like 104 degrees so we were 8 or 9 degrees away from fishing in a Jacuzzi. It was remarkable.

It's been really hot down here for the last 8 or 10 days, but it's supposed to cool off later in the week for the tournament with highs in the upper 80s, which will be like a cool front. I'm looking forward to that.

The fish still bite when it's that warm, though. I guess they're used to it by now. I'd say I had a productive day. I stayed in Pool 5 all day, but I had come down and pre-practiced, which is something I've never done for the Cup. I've never won it either so I figured I'd try it this year. I don't know how much it'll help.

I found the fishing to be similar to what it was back then. It's just not easy to catch quality fish here. I think the winning weight will surprise some people on the low side. Over 4 days, it's going to be tough to catch a good bag every day. There will be some in the teens, but you just have to fish around. It's not the type of place where you can just sit on a honey hole and catch a good limit in one place.

There's nothing you can really count on other than certain areas where you can drop your trolling motor and just fish around. I think you'll see a lot of small limits and I think this is going to be a real close tournament decided by ounces possibly.

The main river has colored up some since I was here for pre-practice. The water's not up, but it has more of a dingy color to it. The backwaters look the same, though.

Luke Clausen
Today was tough. I caught some fish, but not the quality I need to catch. I learned a few things, though, but I'll have to wait to see later in the week. I ran around a lot and looked around because I'm not all that familiar with the river. A lot of it is new to me. I'll go look around again tomorrow and try a different pool.