Coby Carden had a superb practice period leading up to his second straight appearance in the Bassmaster Classic as a representative of the B.A.S.S. Nation. The weather was warm and sunny over the weekend prior to the event and he was hammering fish inhabiting stained water in depths of 3 feet or less.
"Seventeen or 18 pounds was about the worst day I had in practice, and on my best day I was pushing 23 or 24," he said.
Those shallow fish didn't much care for the bitterly cold weather that moved in just prior to the tournament, though. All Carden could manage on day 1 was a 9-03 limit. That wasn't terrible – it put him in the top half of the 66-anger field – but he knew the potential to catch a lot more was there if conditions changed.
They did on day 2. The sun shone brightly from mid-morning on and the air and water both warmed up a bit. Between 10 o'clock and noon, Carden found the setup to be much like the one he'd exploited during practice ¬– the bigger fish had moved up to the laydowns and were looking to eat.
He sacked 19-13 for the day and his stringer, headed up by a 5 1/2-pounder, catapulted him all the way to 7th place. Instead of sitting on the cutline bubble, he'd become a contender for the title, trailing leader Takahiro Omori by less than 3 pounds.
His fish didn't like the dark and rainy scenario that emerged on day 3 and he boxed only three keepers for 8-02, ending up in 15th place.
"I think I could have caught them (like he did on day 2) every day if it had stayed sunny the whole time, but a lot of other people could have as well," he said. "A lot of them were probably resident fish, but at the same time it really warmed up the week before we got there, so a lot of them probably came to the shallow water to get ready to do their (spawning) deal."
He focused his attention on a single creek and threw a homemade balsa-wood crank bait.
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