Tyler Hopes Step Back Results In Forward Leap

Like almost all western-bred anglers who've made the jump to tour-level competition, Mark Tyler is proficient at a variety of techniques. But he thinks his versatility might've been a hindrance on the Bassmaster Elite Series last year.

The California native, who now resides just outside tiny Vian, Okla., failed to finish among the Top 50 in each of the first eight Elite Series tournaments of 2008. That fruitless stretch in which he failed to cash a check caused him to re-evaluate the way he approached his practice sessions, and the result was a solid conclusion to the Elite campaign, followed by profitable FLW Series outings on both coasts.

That gives him confidence as he prepares for the '09 season.

"I had to get back more to my roots, my strong suits," he said. "This may sound weird, by my confidence is so high right now that I'm not scared of failure anymore.

"Everybody out there (on the Elite Series) is all-in – we're spending a lot of money to fish, and it can make you start to think you need to make five or six or seven or however many checks just to break even. I didn't do that – I had a horrible year, but I still survived, and that makes me a little less afraid of failure. I'm just going to go back to doing what I do best and see what happens when I go that route."

Too Many Dimensions

Tyler, who's perhaps best-known for catching the largest fish that's ever gone to the scale in Bassmaster competition (14-09 at the 1999 California Delta Western Invitational) had long prided himself on his well-rounded skill set. He could flip heavy jigs and dropshot tiny worms, and do just about everything else in between.

When he began practice for a tournament, he tried to pinpoint the one pattern that he thought gave him the single-best opportunity to win. He now thinks that approach might be a bit too broad-minded.

"I needed to go back and be a little more one- or two-dimensional," he said. "Flipping and throwing spinnerbaits and swimbaits have been my strengths.

"This year I'm going to throw a lot more swimbaits, and I'm going to keep a flipping stick in my hand from the first day of practice until I've proven to myself that that pattern's not available to me."

He admitted that his confidence began to wane as last year's slump wore on. He didn't change things up until the ninth event at Old Hickory, when all hopes of qualifying for this year's Bassmaster Classic had been dashed and he realized that even re-qualifying for the Elites (the Top 84 in the Angler of the Year (AOY) race were guaranteed slots for '09) would be a chore.

"I decided that if I was going to go out, I'd go out doing what got me here. In practice, I started actively looking for what I do best.

"At Old Hickory (where he finished a season-best 21st), I said to heck with the ledges, and I went to the shallow water upriver and flipped. At Oneida, I'd always split my time between smallmouths and largemouths and I'd never made a check, so I just put it all on the line and went out flipping and throwing topwaters for largemouth, and I had my best finish ever there (35th)."

The Oneida event was the last of the season. And when all the numbers had been tallied, he sat at No. 84 on the points list – the last angler above the automatic requalification cutoff.

"I hung around on Sunday until the last fish was weighed, and when I ended up 84th by a point, honestly, I was proud of myself. It was a gut check because nothing went my way most of the year, but I found a way to dig it out.

"I knew (BASS) would end up going down the list a little to get the field for this year, but it was a matter of principle. I didn't have to wait for them to call me."

No Specific Objectives

After that moral victory at Oneida, Tyler was right back in western New York a month later for the Eastern Division FLW Series finale at Champlain. He finished 55th and banked another check.

A month after that, he was back in his native state and at the site his greatest glory as a pro angler. He finished 2nd to Ish Monroe at the last Western Division Series event at the Delta.

With his confidence brimming, he's anxious to get the new Elite Series season under way. But he's not the type to set hard-and-fast goals as to what he'd like to accomplish this year.

"To me, that kind of thing doesn't make any sense," he said. "I've been at this for quite awhile now, and after a year like last year, I know that seasons kind of take on an identity of their own and the harder you try, the worse they can become.

"I don't like to put numbers on the things I'm striving for. I want to go out and do the best I can at every event and leave it at that."

Notable

> Tyler has been taking 5-mile runs this offseason on the country roads outside Vian with Cricket, his 4-year-old black Labrador retriever. "The whole time I'm running, my focus is on fishing," he said. "It helps me both mentally and physically."

> He finished in the 60s four times last year, which usually meant he was only a few pounds away from a check. "A lot of times I just didn't get the bite I needed. I started wondering why I couldn't get a 5-pound bite when everybody else seemed to be able to."