Kevin Johnson knew he had a spot that held a lot of good fish when last week's Lake Okeechobee FLW Tour got under way. He got there late on day 1, though, and didn't catch any of them, and was forced to take five run-of-the-mill keepers to the stage.
His opening-day bag weighed 9-01 and left him mired in 99th place. The following day, the Arizonan jumped 85 spots with an 18-02 stringer to make the Top 20 in his third career Tour event (he competed in two during the 2011 season).
"The wind was just howling, like 30 mph, and I just slowed down, put the Power-Poles down and picked apart the areas little by little," he said in describing how his stellar second day unfolded. "I was on a giant spawning flat and I fished any isolated lily pad or piece of grass.
"I'd lift the poles up, drift 10 feet, then put them back down and do the same thing."
The fish in his primary area didn't start biting in practice until at least midday, and that's why he wasn't in a hurry to get there on day 1. It was 1 o'clock before he arrived, though, and that didn't leave him enough time to thoroughly dissect the many pieces of cover.
He went there from the get-go on day 2 and caught his first fish at 9:30. He boated a 6 1/2-pounder at 10:30 and a 7-05 about 45 minutes later.
He threw Yamamoto Senko's on both days, utilizing both the 5- and 6-inch versions in black/blue.
It was just a totally different pace on the second day. Fishing slowly was the key to catching those big females."
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