Arkansas legend Larry Nixon bit his nails a few times over the weekend. He came into the Pickwick FLW Tour Major at 35th in the points – five spots ahead of the Forrest Wood Cup cutoff. He missed the Top-20 cut at Pickwick and finished 58th, but the points didn't settle out until everyone was done fishing yesterday.
In the end Nixon tied with Robbie Dodson for 39th in the points, but Dodson won the tiebreaker and pushed Nixon down to 40th, where he's last man in for the Cup. Close call.
The last time the Cup was in Hot Springs, Ark. the field fished Ouachita and local Scott Suggs won. The time before that, the field fished Hamilton and Nixon's best friend George Cochran won.
Nixon finished 27th at the Ouachita Cup and 11th at the Hamilton Cup.
"I'm definitely looking at it as having a chance to win," Nixon said of the upcoming Ouachita Cup. "It's the time of year I like. It's the type of water I like. If I can just get on the right pattern down there I'll have a good chance."
He added that his disappointing finish at Pickwick was the product of several factors, but most pronounced was how difficult it was to move around. He made a bad decision the first morning when he left a spot with 10-13, then never could get onto another area he wanted to fish. He should have sat there and caught the heck out of them all day in the first spot, he said.
