By John Johnson
BassFan Senior Editor


Derek Remitz told BassFan this week that he's opted to step away from tour-level competition in 2016 and focus his efforts on guiding at Lake Guntersville near his home in Grant, Ala.

"I needed a break from that and I felt like it was time to do something else," said Remitz, who's competed on the Bassmaster Elite Series since 2007. "What it comes down to is money – I didn't have the finances to do it. The guiding on Guntersville has been picking up, so I decided to try that for a year or two.

"I'm signed up for the (Bassmaster) Southern Opens and I'll fish every (local and regional) tournament that comes through Guntersville. I still want to stay in fishing, but it's a different way to make a living at it, and my focus will be local instead of national."

Many Ups and Downs

Remitz exploded onto the pro fishing scene in '07 when he won his debut Elite Series event at Lake Amistad, then nearly made it two in a row with a runner-up showing at the California Delta. Two tournaments later, he posted a 5th at Clarks Hill.

The single-digit placements got a lot more scarce after that, though – in fact, he went the next 3 years without one. He made three final-day appearances during his excellent 2010 campaign, when he ended up a career-best 11th in the Angler of the Year (AOY) race.

He had a 3rd (Guntersville) and a 7th (BASSFest at Kentucky Lake) this year, but cashed just one check in the other six derbies. Five of those finishes were 82nd or worse and he ended up 71st in the points.

He hasn't qualified for a Bassmaster Classic since the 2011 edition, when he finished 3rd behind Kevin VanDam and Aaron Martens while sharing a portion of the Louisiana Delta with the two superstars.

"I've thought about (2007) a lot, especially the last couple years, and looking back on it I think, all in all, it's been a pretty good career," he said. "I wasn't as consistent the last few years and I attribute a lot of that to everybody out there (having) gotten better.

"As for myself, I don't know exactly, but it could be that I wasn't as much into it as I was before, and I know I wasn't having as much fun doing it. When you've got that going on subconsciously, it's a lot harder to fish clean."

He said frustration was the dominant theme of the past 5 seasons in which he finished 56th or lower in the AOY race.

"You try not to get in that rut, but it's hard not to get discouraged and you start expecting something bad to happen. It's kind of weird, but for the last 2 years the tournaments I had good practices for I ended up 90th or 100th and the ones when I didn't have good practices were usually a lot better.

"It sucks to say it, but you can't fish clean when you're always worried about checks."

A New Opportunity

There's certainly no shortage of guides working at Guntersville, and the choices include a substantial number of tour pros who supplement their incomes by running trips on the famed Tennessee River impoundment. Because the lake is a "destination fishery" and high on a lot of weekend anglers' bucket lists, there's plenty of work to go around.

Remitz plans to capitalize on that situation.

"I've tallied up what I've done so far this year, and in the last 3 or 4 months I've done just over 35 trips," he said. "I've tried to average at least two or three a week.

"If I lived somewhere else this decision wouldn't have been so easy, but this is a place that everybody wants to come fish. I don't think I'm going to make as much money as I have been, but I'm not going to spend near as much, either."

As a guide, there's pressure to come through, but it takes on a different form than in tournament angling.

"It's more about being accommodating," he said. "I've had days when we've caught them good and days when we struggled, but as long as you're working hard, (the client) can definitely tell.

"I've had mostly happy customers so far, but there's no way you can have a 100-percent success rate on that."

He won't close the door on future tour-level competition, but he'll need to rediscover something that he once had that's since gotten away from him.

"It's not out of the question, but I know this is what I'm going to be doing for at least the next year or two. I need to step back and regroup and maybe in a couple years I can come back with that killer instinct.

"That's what you have to have to fish against those guys because everybody's so darn good."

Notable

> To book a guided trip with Remitz at Guntersville, click here.