BassFan Winning Pattern
Jordon Flipped Clumps, Buzzbait Helped Too

Photo: ESPN Outdoors Jordon noted that 'clumpy' milfoil was the key to his flipping bite.

Things changed again on day 2 when bluebird skies and a stiff wind predominated. Day 3 (Saturday) saw a dramatic increase in boat traffic that killed a number of pros who were in crowded areas. Then day 4 got crazy once again when most moved on to new water.

Kelly Jordon's new water was the best, and one key grass patch gave up the three winning bites. There're more to his win than that, though.

Here's a closer look at how Jordon won the Potomac Elite Series.

Practice

Practice was tough for almost everyone in the 102-angler field. Jordon's approach was two-fold and he concentrated on topwater in the mornings. He then went and flipped matted grass – mainly milfoil – in the afternoons.

"I learned how they were relating to the tides, and I found stretches with the right-looking grass," he said. "And I had a lot of confidence in the buzzbait."

Hs went into competition with two primary areas – one for buzzing, one for flipping – and a number of secondary spots.

Days 1 & 2

> Day 1: 5, 17-09
> Day 2: 5, 12-03 (10, 29-12)

Jordon started day 1 in his buzzbait spot, which was in a little bay. He caught only small fish and moved to another spot with the buzzer. Soon after, a storm hit. He stopped short of his destination and "jacked around" in a little bay for an hour.

"I finally said 'The heck with this' and I went downriver, but then a lightning storm came through," he noted. "There was no place to take cover. It was a terrible storm – it rained like 2 inches in an hour. With the wind, I couldn't get back upriver."

Photo: ESPN Outdoors Kelly Jordon started strong on day 1, suffered on day 2, made a crucial mistake on day 3, but prevailed on day 4.

His two flip-fish weighed nearly 10 pounds, and along with three smaller ones from the morning, he weighed 17-09, which put him in 3rd place.

Day 2 was a disaster. He didn't catch any big fish, went three-for-eleven on the buzzbait, weighed 12-03 and dropped to 6th place.

"It was a disappointing day," he said.

Days 3 & 4

> Day 3: 4, 12-14
> Day 4: 5, 17-15 (9, 30-13)
> Total = 19, 60-09

Jordon started day 3 – another bluebird, post-frontal day – in his best buzzbait spot and caught a 4-pounder on the first cast. He had four more blowups after that, and hooked two with a Senko that he threw back.

He hooked his third fish, a 1 3/4-pounder, in the tongue, and was sure it would die. BASS rules prohibit the culling of dead fish at the Potomac, so if he kept it, he wouldn't be able to cull it. Limits hadn't been a problem, but he agonized over the decision and opted to throw it back.

He caught a fourth fish (a 3-pounder) late, but never caught a fifth keeper. His four-fish total weighed 12-14. Turns out the rest of the field had a tough day too and he moved up to 4th. But if he'd kept the fish, he'd have been the leader.

Instead, he started the final day exactly 1 pound behind leader Rick Morris. And the fish he tossed back was front-and-center in his mind.

About that decision, he said: "It's like the 2-point conversion in football. If you make it, you're a hero. If not, you're fired. But it was calculated. It was the thing to do with the information I had at the time."

He started day 4 with the buzzbait and missed two bites, but caught them both with a throwback Senko. They were both 1 1/2-pounders. After that, he decided to go flip a limit spot, with the goal of eventually heading downriver.

"I went to where there were mats at high tide and fished some areas I'd found in practice," he said. "I wanted to catch a limit, then do some running."

He did catch a limit, but it was only 7 pounds.

"I was getting ready to leave – to run downriver – and saw something good," he added. "I pulled in and caught a 4 1/2-pounder."

That's when things took off.

"I said, 'What the heck's this thing doing here? This one's lost.' It was really thick, matted stuff. I was ready to get out of there and said to myself, 'I should fish this longer.'

"I got another bite, set the hook and it was a 4-pounder. Then about 10 minutes later I caught a 5 1/2. It was all between 11:00 and 12:00."

And that was it. He weighed those three fish and two rats for 17-15. He edged 2nd-place Reese by just 7 ounces.

Photo: Kicker Fish Bait Co./Lake Fork Tackle Jordon flipped a Kicker Fish Kicker Kraw (top) in the super-thick grass, and a Lake Fork Tackle Craw Tube (bottom) in sparser stuff.

> Buzzbait gear: 7' medium-action Fenwick Techna AV rod, Abu Garcia Revo STX casting reel, 20-pound Berkley Trilene Sensation line, 3/8-ounce Boogey Man buzzbait (chartreuse/white with chrome blade), 2/0 Gamakatsu trailer hook.

> About the Boogey Man, he said: "I bought some at a tournament at Kentucky Lake. It's a headbanger – the blade hits the head of the bait when it spins."

> Senko gear: Same rod, same reel, 17-pound Berkley Vanish fluorocarbon line, 4/0 Gamakatsu EWG Superline hook, no weight, Gary Yamamoto Senko (watermelon/black-flake).

> Flipping gear: 7'9" heavy-action Fenwick Techna AV rod, same reel, 65-pound Spiderwire Stealth braid, 4/0 and 5/0 Owner extra-wide-gap offset hooks, 1-ounce Lake Fork Tackle tungsten Mega-Weight (unpegged), Lake Fork Tackle Craw Tube (junebug and blue bruiser), NetBait Paca Craw (black/blue with silver-flake) and Kicker Fish Bait Co. Kicker Craw (black/blue with blue-flake).

> He noted he fished the Craw Tube around sparser grass. In thicker mats, he switched between the Paca Craw and Kicker Craw. On the final day, he only threw the Craw Tube and Kicker Craw.

> His Kicker Kraws were in a Ziploc bag that friend and fellow pro Cody Bird had given him a year and a half ago, when the bait was still in prototype stage. "They're real slender and penetrated the super-thick mats," he said. "I couldn't get the Paca Craw to go down through, but the Kicker Kraw did."

> His flipping rod was a one-piece model (non-telescoping) that's actually a muskie rod.

Photo: Abu Garcia Of all his gear and tackle, Jordon said the most critical was his flipping setup, which included an Abu Garcia Revo STX reel.

Main factor in his success – "The fact that I love to grass-fish and I was excited about the fishing. I'm not a big tide-fisherman, so I can't tell you what the fish do. When they leave me I don't know where they go. But when I see the right kind of conditions and the way the grass is, that's the key deal. Here, it was clumpy milfoil with holes. Clumpy was the key."

Performance Edge – "My key piece of equipment this week was my whole flipping combo. Actually, I was doing more pitching than flipping with that big rod. I'm just so comfortable with that setup, and the braid."

Notable

> On day 1, Jordon left himself 20 minutes to make the 13- to 14-minute run back in. He exited his area through heavy grass, then stopped in the river to reverse the grass off the big motor. He accidentally backed over a crab pot – the buoy popped up "out of nowhere." When he got back up on pad he noticed a drop in RPM, so he stopped and saw a rope from the crab pot wrapped around his prop. He balanced on the motor and cavitation plate, spun the prop and it came off quickly. "I made it with 3 to 5 minutes to spare," he said.

> Maybe memories of Clarks Hill earlier this year convinced him to release his doomed fish on day 3. "I kept a 1-pounder at Clarks this year that died," he said. "It was the wrong call, but this was the right call in my opinion."

> How close was the finish? He started day 4 just 6 ounces ahead of Skeet Reese, and their day-4 bags were 1 ounce apart. The final margin of victory was 7 ounces.