At the recent Grand Lake Bassmaster Elite Series in Oklahoma, a foul word sprung like a chorus from the field. That word was "snag." Rocks, brush and whatever else was down there stretched tackle supplies to their limits. The jig fishermen took to swimming their jigs just above bottom in order to keep their lines wet.
Not Mike McClelland. He used a slow, methodical approach through brush and rocks to utterly dominate the event.
He had the bite so wired, it was all but over after day 2.
He led every day, caught the big fish 2 of the 4 days, and won by a massive 15-09 margin.
It was his fourth BASS win, but his first at the tour/series level.
Here's how he did it.
Practice
McClelland's a veteran. He fished his first BASS event in the late '80s, and won back-to-back Bassmaster Invitationals in 1996.
He's also a veteran of the mid-America bass battlegrounds, where regional studs go head-to-head year after year on circuits like the Heartland and Central Pro-Am trails.
So he came to Grand with a long history on the lake – he'd fished it an estimated 60 times through the years. But he also came to Grand with a mission to win.
He felt some momentum after a recent Top 12 finish at the Bassmaster Memorial, and the momentum intensified as he drew closer to his former stomping grounds.
His practice strategy was straightforward: determine the depth at which the concentrations of fish were holding, then find and mark as much cover and structure at that depth as possible.
"The biggest I learned in practice was the depth range the fish were predominantly at," he said. "The better fish were deeper than 10 feet, but shallower than 20 feet.
"I tried not to catch fish in practice," he noted. "I bent the hooks over, or cut the barbs off. When you've caught as many good ones as I have here, you know when you get the right bites."
Once he had the right depth, he began to dial in his bait choice. "It's important to have the correct bait to get the fish to bite it. I went through a number of different baits in practice. I fished a (Zoom) Mag Lizard, but it got smaller bites than a big (Zoom Super) Hog or regular Hog.
"So I decided to either Carolina-rig a Brush Hog, or use the new 1/2-ounce Jewel Heavy Cover Finesse jig."
Competition
> Day 1: 5, 21-09
> Day 2: 5, 25-03
> Day 3: 5, 18-03
> Day 4: 5, 14-08
> Total = 20, 79-07
McClelland entered day 1 of competition with about 30 places to fish, and hit nearly all of them throughout the 4 days.
No one spot was key – rather, it was the mix of them all that helped him.
He noted is was a "timing deal. There were so many places where you'd pull up once and catch nothing, then pull up 2 hours later and catch two 5-pounders. Whenever bait was there – big gizzard shad – the fish were feeding."
He simply rotated through his areas and tried to time things right. On days 1 and 2, for example, the late-afternoon bite was key.
He didn't always hit it on the nose though. On the final day, when he weighed his lightest sack, he said he missed the late bite by about 10 minutes. Instead, he caught three on his first stop, and his fourth came at about 9:30, then his fifth at 11:00.
After that, the pressure was off and he slowed down. He eventually caught a 4-06 from the same spot where he'd caught a big one the day before.
Grand is notorious for stealing baits, and McClelland lost a bunch, but he said the Jewel jig helped him avoid a lot of hangups.
Pattern Notes
About his pattern, he said: "All my spots were identical. They were subtle points that you really couldn't see by looking from the bank.
"All of them had a ledge or cut close to the tip of the point. They'd taper off to 20 feet, then roll off hard into the channel. And they all had a mixture of rock and brush."
He'd work the point from different angles. Sometimes he stayed shallow and threw to deeper water, sometimes he tried to drag his jig or plastic down the ledge.
"I really mixed it up," he said. "A lot of it depended on wind direction. I like to bring my baits with the wind as much as I can."
About his retrieve, he noted: "It was a very subtle, slow drag. The biggest key, I think, in my ability to catch bigger fish, was I used almost a deadstick technique.
"I'd drag the jig into a brushpile and shake it – yo-yo it. The big ones would come up, eat it, and start swimming out of the brush.
"I had it dialed in," he added. "I very seldom caught a fish just randomly casting. I had everything marked as GPS coordinates, and I'd throw a marker buoy."
About not losing as many baits as other anglers, he said: "This lake is notorious for really taking away baits. Not to say I didn't lose a bunch, but my camera guy (on day 4) said, 'I've filmed a lot of guys, and I'm amazed at how you get that jig through cover. It's mind-boggling.'
"It's definitely a well-deigned jig, but it takes some finesse to get it through there."
Winning Gear Notes
> Jig gear: 7'2" medium-heavy Falcon Reaction Series rod, Quantum Tour Edition casting reel (6.3:1), 20-pound Seaguar InvizX and 25-pound Seaguar Grand Max fluorocarbons, 1/2-ounce Jewel Heavy Cover Finesse jig.
> He fished two different jig colors. The PBJ color he paired with a Zoom Tiny Brush Hog, and the PBJ/smoke jig was paired with a green-pumpkin/blue Tiny Brush Hog.
> Carolina-rig gear: 7' heavy-action Falcon Expert Series rod, same reel, 25-pound Grand Max, 5/0 Gamakatsu round-bend hook, 1/2- and 3/4-ounce Zoom Carolina-Rig weights (lead), Zoom Brush Hog (green pumpkin with tentacles dipped in garlic-scented Spike-It Garlic Dip-N-Glo.)
Notable
> Main factor in his success – "It was my time. I still am a diehard believer that when it's your time, it's your time. And I think the fact that I worked the bait slow and methodically."
> One example of how important it was to fish slow: "I fished behind people all week and caught fish they didn't," McClelland said. "Edwin Evers and I were fishing one point, and we'd been fishing it all week. I pulled up after he left and caught a 5-pounder."
> He noted that when white bass invaded a point, the largemouths completely shut down. They wouldn't bite again until the white bass left.
> The Jewel Heavy Cover Finesse jig isn't available yet, but will be soon.
