Second-year FLW Tour pro Tim Frederick of Florida said his big comeback on day 2 of last week's event at Beaver Lake was simply a case of being in the right place at the right time.
Frederick began the day in 96th place after weighing a 6-10 opening-round bag. He ended it in 13th after a 16-00 haul that he amassed in a little over an hour.
He'd saved a couple hours at the end of the day to devote to Prairie Creek, the site of the launch and the locale where the vast majority of tournament-caught bass at Beaver are released. He encountered at least one boat on every place he wanted to stop, so he continued going farther back into the creek until he reached its termination.
It was there that he hit paydirt. He used a square-bill crankbait to catch a dozen quality fish, with most of them coming off a single log in about 5 1/2 feet of water. The biggest was a 4 1/2-pounder, and he lost one that might've been a half-pound heavier than that.
"I just went fishing like I would have back home in Florida and it worked out," he said. "Sometimes it pays to go back to your roots.
"They were there and ready to eat, and I was ready to feed them. I went back the next day thinking I was going to smash them again, but the water had come up another three feet (the level rose constantly throughout the event) and it was nothing by rolling, orange mud."
He ended up with a 17th-place finish – his second top-20 placement of the season (he was 14th at the Harris Chain in his home state). He fared no better than 82nd in any event as a rookie in 2016 and was 155th at Beaver.
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