4th: Kenyon Hill
> Day 1: 5, 15-10
> Day 2: 5, 17-13
> Day 3: 5, 09-09
> Day 4: 5, 11-02
> Total = 20, 54-02
Kenyon Hill cashed in on the toad bite, which overall was strong, but highly unpredictable.
"I was basically catching pre-spawn fish in Kissimmee," he said.
"They spawn with every moon phase down here in the spring, and there was (a full moon) coming around the corner.
"The fish were up cruising around, and starting to get on the beds a little bit. I was fishing the areas with heavy vegetation where they get in and spawn."
He generally fished in the 1- to 2-foot depth zones and targeted "whatever was on the bank – maiden cane, pads, hydrilla, eel grass, reeds, whatever."
> Toad gear: 7'2" heavy-action American Rodsmiths Kicker Stick, Abu Garcia Revo casting reel, 65-pound Spiderwire Stealth braid, 6/0 Owner TwistLock hook, Zoom Horny Toad (black).
> How powerful was his heavy-action rod? "You can use it to do alligators," he said.
> Main factor in his success – "I think it was just being patient with it every day. The water temp would start out at 64 to 66 degrees, and it would take until about 1:00 in the afternoon until it would creep up to 68 or 70. That's when you'd start catching your better fish. I was catching something in the mornings, but with every tick of the clock, it was closer to the time when the bite was going to be better. So you just had to have the patience to stick with it."
> Performance edge – "It was probably that rod. As soon as they hit it they try to bury down in that maiden cane and whatever's around, so you need something to really whack them, even at end of a long cast, to get them dragging over the top of that stuff."
Bill Lowen concentrated on islands in Kissimmee and never had company.
5th: Bill Lowen
> Day 1: 5, 16-15
> Day 2: 5, 13-06
> Day 3: 5, 14-07
> Day 4: 5, 08-07
> Total = 20, 53-03
Bill Lowen also swam a bait en route to his 5th-place finish. What made his pattern so different, though, was he fished a unique area all by himself.
"My main pattern was swimming a jig up shallow on Kissimmee," he said. "When the tournament started, I thought I'd catch my fish flipping, and I caught two good fish the first day flipping. But that bite just kind of petered out in the conditions. I ended up catching them on a jig. I swam it for the remainder of the tournament and caught everything else on that."
The key to his bite, he said, was alligator grass around "some islands out in the middle of the lake." He noted there was "a lane" between the shore and the grass, and the fish were in that lane.
"It had kind of a sandy bottom, and fish were cruising in those lanes. There were some fish in there on some beds, but the fish I was catching were pre-spawn fish. I swam that jig through those lanes and they'd come out and get it."
He never saw another boat in the same area all 4 days, and fished water that was 2 feet deep or less.
> Jig gear: 7 1/2-foot All Pro signature-series Swim Jig rod, Abu Garcia Revo STX casting reel, 30-pound Stren Super Braid, 1/4-ounce Davis Paca swim-jig and 1/4-ounce homemade swim-jig (black/blue), unnamed twintail trailer.
> He swam a jig the week before at the Harris Chain and finished 15th.
> Main factor in his success – "Probably just having 110% confidence in that particular presentation. When I pick that jig up and feel I can catch them on it, I feel like no one can beat me. I've been swimming a jig since I can remember."
> Performance edge – "The All Pro rod. It's a rod we worked on all last year, and it's designed for swimming a jig. Basically what we did is take a 7 1/2-foot flipping stick and put a spinnerbait tip on it. Instead of trying to swim a jig on a broomstick, you can roll-cast it and all the other things you can't do with a flipping stick. And you can horse them out."
Notable
> To read about how 2nd-place Ray Sedgwick and 3rd-place Scott Rook caught their fish, click here.
