Out of eight Bassmaster Elite Series regular-season events in 2009, Alton Jones finished among the Top 20 seven times and came within a single placement of cashing a check in every event. It was a different story this year, though, as he logged just one Top 20 and plummeted to 56th on the final points list.
It was a slide that few could've anticipated – most notably the Texan himself.
"Back when I was looking ahead to the schedule for 2010, I really liked what I saw," said the 2008 Bassmaster Classic champion. "It had places like (California's) Clear Lake, where I'd won in the past. The only question was Smith Mountain – I'd never done as well there as I would've liked.
"Clear Lake, Guntersville and Kentucky Lake – those are three places I should've excelled at, and I didn't. But I did have a few bright spots, like the 14th at Smith Mountain."
Murky View at Clear Lake
Jones didn't change anything about his approach to tournaments this year – after the campaign he had in '09, that would've been extremely foolish. Things just didn't work out like they had the previous several seasons, and he has no concrete explanation as to why that was the case.
"I can't point to any one thing, but there are pivotal moments in any season that can change your momentum and can throw your whole season off," he said. "It can change the way you approach the rest of the season."
One of those occurred at Clear Lake, where he'd topped the field in 2003 but finished 65th this time around.
"It just came down to making wrong decisions on areas to start. I spent a lot of time in practice trying to get a swimbait bite going, and hardly anybody was able to do that except for (winner Byron Velvick). It was something I never could make work and I ended up having to scramble in the tournament.
"I had a feeling that there was a certain quality of fish that I needed to be catching, and that I needed to go and fish that way. I found some bed-fish in 6 or 7 feet of water that were really hard to catch and once I started doing that, I was no longer fishing for the fish I'd targeted in practice.
"I could get some to bite finesse stuff," he continued, "but they weren't the right-size fish. I caught a better sack (on day 2), but I ended up spending so much time catching little ones that I'd gotten away from where the bar was going to be set and I ended up getting too far behind."
Time to Refocus
Jones, who dropped from 4th to 38th in the BassFan World Rankings over the course of the 2010 campaign, said he'll spend a lot of time on the water this offseason in an effort to get his mental game back to where it had been the previous few years. Such a program has worked before – he had an off year in 2005 that caused him to miss two Classics as the sport's premier event transitioned from summer to late winter.
"I'll try to look back and take the positives out of the season and concentrate on those little bright spots," he said. "I don't dwell on the negatives because, after all, it's just fishing. It's basically a game.
Jones didn't have as many fun times on the weigh-in stage this year as he had in previous seasons.
"It's not that I don't take it seriously, but you have to have some perspective on reality. I rely on my faith heavily – God has a reason for everything – and next year will be a completely different year."
It'll be a lot different in one respect – his son and practice partner Alton Jr. (known around the circuit as "Little Alton") won't be along for the ride. He'll enter Baylor University next week and will join the fishing team there, but the demands of a college with rigorous academic standards won't allow him to hit the road with his dad.
"He wasn't around for most of the last half of this season because he was busy with school stuff. He's going to live on campus at Baylor, but I'm sure we'll be seeing him when laundry time comes around."
The elder Jones has a couple of hunting trips planned for the fall and he'll also spend considerable time at hawg-rich Falcon Lake in the southern part of his home state.
"It's a 6-hour drive, but I leave the RV there during the offseason. It's a great place to build your confidence, that's for sure."
Notable
> Jones said he'll soon start mapping out his strategy for pre-fishing the venues on the 2011 Elite Series schedule. The only one he's never been to is West Point Lake in Georgia.
> He opted not to fish the PAA Tournament Series this year. "With this being Little Alton's last couple of months at home, we decided to use the summer as family time," he said.
> Little Alton has been fishing out of his dad's 2009 Skeeter, but Jones has decided to sell that boat and give his son his 2010 FX. "He's made a lot of good choices and I thought it would be a nice reward for him as he goes off to school," he said.
