Rest Of Top 5 Stayed In Their Comfort Zone

By Todd Ceisner
BassFan Editor

Bull Shoals Lake and Lake Norfork proved to be worthy venues for last week’s unique Elite Series event that saw the competitors hop back and forth between the two lakes, a format that hadn’t been tried before.

Both lakes are loaded with 2 1/4- to 3-pound fish with several above-average specimens swimming around. Most competitors remarked that it was a fun event based on the sheer numbers of fish they caught.

What’s more is both lakes offered the anglers an opportunity to employ whatever technique they wanted. Reaction baits worked for some, while the power-fishermen could do their thing along the bank with their trolling motor cranked all the way up.

With the water at Bull Shoals up in the bushes and buck brush, and with fish starting to swarm the shallows under a full moon, it was a shallow-water angler’s dream scenario except for the skittish bed fish that were a challenge to catch. At Norfork, which fished much smaller, pros were surprised at the volume of bites they got each day while trying to figure out how to trigger the better fish.

For those who finished immediately behind winner Randall Tharp, it was all about being comfortable. From runner-up Skeet Reese to Bill Lowen in 5th, those at the top of the heap were able to stick with what they like to do and ride it for 4 days.

Here’s a recap of how the rest of the Top 5 figured out the two-lake format:

2nd: Skeet Reese

> Day 1: 5, 13-04
> Day 2: 5, 12-07
> Day 3: 5, 19-02
> Day 4: 5, 14-11
> Total = 20, 59-08

Note: The following information was gathered from publicly available interviews done with Reese at or after the Bull Shoals/Norfork Elite Series.

Skeet Reese fished at two different speeds last week – Bull Shoals Slow and Norfork Fast. His damage at Bull Shoals was done flipping a craw/creature bait in bushes and buck brush while a swimbait/crankbait combo is what he relied on at Norfork.

“Even though these lakes are so close together, they fished completely different for me,” Reese told Davy Hite for Bassmaster.com’s First Look.

He caught most of his fish Thursday winding a square-bill crankbait.

He said on stage during Sunday’s weigh-in that he tapped into the flipping bite at Bull Shoals on the first day of practice. It produced 12 1/2 pounds on Friday, but he changed areas Saturday and came in with a tournament-best 19-02 to move into 3rd entering the final day.

“The areas I thought I’d catch them, I couldn’t catch them,” he said on stage. “On Saturday, I went to water I’d never seen before in my life and just ran a pattern flipping shallow.

“I just cracked their heads and it was so fun. I grew up learning from Dee Thomas, the godfather of flipping, fishing out in California. I feel comfortable with a flipping stick in my hand. That’s how I grew up. When you flip up into a foot of water, it’s so shallow you think there can’t be a fish up there. There’s one little root or a tiny piece of shade and then something comes out and crushes it.”

His game plan for Sunday was to fish farther out in the main creeks that he had on Thursday.

“I saw something at the end of the day Thursday that told me the fish might be further out than I thought,” Reese told Hite. “The bigger fish were coming more toward the main lake.”

He caught a few keepers cranking, then switched to the swimbait for the rest of the day. When the wind picked up later in the morning so did his catch rate and he momentarily moved into the lead after one particular flurry.

“(Chris) Zaldain and I worked together some this week and I knew he was on a similar pattern, but didn’t know where he was,” Reese said.

At one point Sunday, they encountered each other and Reese opted to cede the area to Zaldain and ran to a different spot.

“I realized the fish were on steeper banks so I tried to find wind-blown rocky banks,” he said. "It was fun. When they hit either bait, they just crushed it.”

> Flipping gear: 8’ heavy-action Wright & McGill Skeet Reese Victory Pro Carbon Flip/Pitch rod, Wright & McGill Skeet Reese Victory Pro Carbon casting reel (7.9:1 gear ratio), 25-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Fluorocarbon line, 1/4-oz. unnamed tungsten worm weight, 5/0 Laser TroKar flipping hook, Berkley Havoc Pit Boss (green-pumpkin).

> Swimbait gear: 7'4" heavy-action Wright & McGill Skeet Reese Victory Pro Carbon Jig/Big Worm rod, Wright & McGill Skeet Reese Victory Pro Carbon casting reel (7.9:1 gear ratio), 20-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Fluorocarbon line, 5/0 Laser TroKar weighted (1/4 oz.) swimbait hook, 6” Berkley PowerBait Hollow Belly (out of production).

> Reese opted for the high-speed reel to compensate for how fast he was moving down the bank. He tried to keep the swimbait down 2 to 4 feet under the surface.

> Crankbait gear: 6’8” medium-action Wright & McGill Skeet Reese S-Glass casting rod, same reel (6.4:1 ratio), 15-pound Berkley Trilene Big Game monofilament line, Lucky Craft 3.5 square-bill crankbait.

3rd: Chris Zaldain

> Day 1: 5, 16-02
> Day 2: 5, 14-12
> Day 3: 5, 14-04
> Day 4: 5, 13-10
> Total = 20, 58-12

Zaldain had a definitive game plan for each lake and he stayed true to them throughout the event to collect his second straight Top-10 finish and match his career-best result in a full-field Elite Series tournament. Through three events, he’s 3rd in the Angler of the Year standings.

“This is by far the swiftest start I’ve had to a season,” he said. “Historically, I’ve gotten off to a slow start, but this is the best I’ve come up with. I know it’s early to think about it, but I have to take advantage of it. It’s all about decisions on the water. I know my practice for Wheeler will be short, but I have a ton of confidence now.”

He built his practice to mimic the format of the tournament – one day at Norfork, two at Bull Shoals and the final day back at Norfork.

“After practice, I was more fired up for the Bull Shoals pattern because I’d found that dropshot spawning pattern in the bushes,” he said. “I had an average practice at Norfork with mostly winding baits – spinnerbaits and swimbaits.”

He started to get dialed in on Norfork’s bigger fish on day 1 of the event.

“I was farther out into the main lake from the creek I was in,” he said. “It seemed like the bigger fish were closer to the clearer water. At that point, my stokage level shifted to Norfork and my game plan then was to hang out for the meat of the tournament at Bull Shoals.”

He mined the buck brush at Bull Shoals for more than 28 pounds over the middle two days, doing all of his damage with a hand-poured 6-inch worm rigged on a dropshot with a 6- to 8-inch dropper leader. He did a masterful job on Friday during the Bassmaster Live coverage as the other anglers with cameras were well out of cell range. That left Zaldain as the featured pro and he openly shared with viewers all of the details of what he was doing.

On Sunday, he went out facing a 6-ounce deficit and relied on the 6-inch swimbait that got his juices going on Thursday. He went back to the same creek and made casts parallel and tight to channel-swing banks with some wind blowing on them. Some of the other leaders like Randall Tharp and Matt Herren were in the same creek arm, but were more toward the back.

“I was in the front third closer to the clearer water,” he said. “I’d put my boat right on the bank almost and I’d be sometimes fishing up hill on those points. I couldn’t ask for more. I put myself in a position to win. I caught a decent bag so I’m happy with top-3 without a doubt.”

> Swimbait gear: 7’2” heavy-action Megabass Orochi XX Perfect Pitch casting rod, Shimano Metanium casting reel (7.4:1 ratio), 15-pound Seaguar InvizX fluorocarbon line, 6" Megabass Magdraft swimbait (whiteback shad).

> Dropshot gear: 7’5” medium-heavy Megabass Orochi XX Extreme Mission casting rod, same reel, same line, 2/0 Laser TroKar finesse worm hook, 6” Roboworm Fat (margarita multilator), 1/4-oz. unnamed dropshot weight.

> Main factor in his success – “Practicing hard on both lakes and establishing strong patterns on both lakes and coming up with a game plan off the water and sticking to it. I kept it simple, to the point where I almost wrote it down.”

> Performance edge – “That 15-pound InvizX line. I was flipping that dropshot in bushes and pulling 4-pounders out of brush. The next day I was throwing a swimbait around boulders and rocks catching 4s. It’s the most versatile line I’ve ever used.”

4th: Matt Herren

> Day 1: 5, 17-00
> Day 2: 5, 11-06
> Day 3: 5, 15-05
> Day 4: 5, 14-15
> Total = 20, 58-10

Matt Herren was one of four anglers in the Top 5 who went into Sunday hoping to lock up his first Elite Series win. He led after day 1 and bounced back after a disappointing day on Friday to get back in contention. Ultimately, he fell 3 pounds short.

“You hate to get that close and not finish the deal,” he said. “I knew I had to have a tremendous day and everybody in front of me had to stumble.

“I screwed up on Friday,” he added. “If I could relive Friday, I would do it differently. You cannot have a hiccup like that in these deals. I just got hung up trying to catch bed-fish when I should’ve just gone fishing.”

His 1-2 punch was a wacky-rigged finesse worm followed up by a 3/8-ounce jig and chunk trailer. He caught a 6-01 brute on Thursday at Norfork on the wacky rig.

“That’s what I wanted to do at Bull Shoals,” he said. “I had a good bite on the wacky rig and was mixing it up with spawning fish.

“The curveball was the water fell in my area and the buck brush got real shallow. I thought with all of the bushes, it would pull them out. Instead of going north when I struggled, I sat there and looked at a 4-pounder … they were laying everywhere on the bank. I couldn’t get any of them to go.”

He opted to not mess with bedding fish on Saturday and went north on Bull Shoals to find more flooded bushes that he worked over with the jig.

“I focused on steeper channel swing banks,” he noted. “On Thursday, a lot of fish were spawning and where I was in the back of that creek they were spawning on those swings.

“We hit it with a perfect moon phase for the fish to spawn, but the falling water (at Bull Shoals) had the fish acting funny.”

> Jig gear: 7’6” heavy-action Kistler Z-Bone casting rod, Ardent Elite casting reel (7.3:1 ratio), 16-pound Gamma Edge fluorocarbon line, 3/8-oz. Santone Lures M Series flipping jig (river bream or green-pumpkin), Reaction Innovations Petite Twerk trailer (green-pumpkin), unnamed chunk trailer (root beer).

> Finesse gear: 7’ medium-heavy Kistler Z-Bone spinning rod, unnamed spinning reel, 16-pound unnamed braided line, 8-pound Gamma Edge fluorocarbon line (leader), 2/0 Roboworm Rebarb hook, 4.5” Reaction Innovations Pocket Rocket (dirty wizard or green-pumpkin purple swirl).

> Main factor in his success – “Recognizing a pattern and duplicating it.”

> Performance edge – “My Humminbird electronics and Lakemaster mapping was really good for these two lakes. For the pattern I was on for the channel swings it was huge.”

5th: Bill Lowen

> Day 1: 5, 13-10
> Day 2: 5, 17-04
> Day 3: 5, 12-12
> Day 4: 5, 14-11
> Total = 20, 58-05

For Bill Lowen, with the opportunity to get spun out at two lakes last week, he wanted to put himself in a position to keep things simple. He wanted to build a good foundation on day 1 at Norfork and then place all of his focus on the following two days at Bull Shoals. He tried to find areas of dirty water on both lakes in practice.

“At Bull Shoals, I had to run forever, but at Norfork, I didn’t have to go that far,” he said. “My whole mindset was to figure out enough to survive on Norfork. I didn’t want to overthink it. I wanted to get out of there on day 1 in a good position and figured 13 or 14 pounds would be good. I felt confident I could do that.”

He bagged 13-10 to accomplish his goal. He flipped a tube around wood on mud flats and worked a jig along shallow bluff banks. Most of his fish came out of 4 to 6 feet of water.

At Bull Shoals, he targeted flooded bushes and bluff banks where fish were setting up to spawn.

“Those deals have notches in them,” he said. “On Bull Shoals, you can see into them. There’s a bed in every little notch. You can blind-cast and catch bedders that way.”

His 17-04 bag on day 2 put him in a tie for the lead with Zaldain heading into the weekend, but his 12-12 bag on Saturday knocked him back a few spots. On the final day, he went through where he’d fished Thursday.

“I missed a shad spawn that I didn’t know was going on,” he said. “I caught two keepers real quick, but then a lot of short fish. I wish I’d figured out the shad spawn earlier so I could key on it. Overall it was a fun week.”

> Jig gear 7’6” heavy-action Castaway Taranis casting rod, Team Lew's Pro Magnesium casting reel (7.5:1 ratio), 15-pound Hi-Seas fluorocarbon line, 3/8-oz. Lure Parts Online Brush Puppy Jig (root beer/brown/orange), unnamed chunk trailer (matching color).

> Flipping gear: Same rod, same reel, same line, 3/16-oz. Reins Tungsten worm weight, 4/0 Mustad Grip Pin EWG worm hook, 4” Tightlines UV Bill Lowen Flippin Tube (black/blue).

> Main factor in his success – “Putting myself in my comfort zone. I always fish better that way and I try to put myself in that situation whenever I can.”

> Performance edge – “It was a combination of everything – good boat, good motor, good electronics. I was making long runs at Bull Shoals and knowing your equipment will get you there and back is a big plus.”

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