Saturday was our Tri-County roadrunner style tournament. Tuesday night I had some pretty significant pain flair up. It didn't get any better by Thursday so I'd gone to the walk in clinic at my doctor. He pretty immediately told me to get to the ER, so I got to spend some time there Thursday and got sent home with painkillers and medication for the infection I'm apparently dealing with. I probably shouldn't have fished the tournament, but like the saying goes; "If you're gonna be dumb, you gotta be tough".
I got to the ramp at the lake I wanted to fish in plenty of time and was surprised that only 5 other trucks were there. Unfortunately, when I picked up my tacklebox out of the back of my truck, I had a shot of pain run through me like I'd been stabbed in the back and kicked in the groin at the same time. I spent several minutes laying on the front of my kayak before I was able to regain composure and finish loading everything. It was a few minutes after first cast before I finally made mine. Didn't take long to catch fish. I watched another angler catch a 20.75" within casting distance of me on a buzzbait, it was a pretty cool catch and he's a good guy so I enjoyed watching it go down. I had a limit pretty fast but mostly small fish as I worked down the lake. I had a huge brushpile that hangs out over a ledge I wanted to fish because it always hold fish. I got snagged in it with my crawtube, retrieved it, and cast a big worm towards the edges of it and got a light tap. My drag slipped terribly when I set the hook, but she stayed stuck and buried into the tree. Thankfully, the 20lb Tatsu held and I slid the net under a solid 20 incher.
I pedaled across to a small group of stumps on the edge of a flat that drops into deeper water. Ran a crankbait through them, nothing. Cast my crawtube to one, got a little peck and the line started moving. Next keeper was a nice 17.25" fish.
Then for some reason, another big surge of pain. I couldn't even lift my feet to the pedals for several minutes, just sat there trying to take deep breaths and hope it would go away. Finally it did somewhat. I paddled close to the shore to a single log and ran a bladed jig down it. Watched a wake shoot over the tree and felt the jolt. The fish looked a lot bigger, but still a decent 16.75" fish.
I had a pretty decent dry spell of just a few small fish, when I switched my craw tube to an old color of Strike King Denny Brauer Flipping tubes. It was like a light switch. I missed several of the bites unfortunately, but the first one I actually hooked was an 18.25" fish.
I caught several more small fish on the tube and a squarebill, and had a serious issue with missing and losing fish. Had a couple solid feeling fish hooked that just came off before I saw them. I hooked and lost or missed fish off the same stump 3 times before finally catching this 17.25" fish.
I have no service at this lake, so I had no idea how I was doing but I kept hearing about big fish and heard a rumor from the neighboring lake of someone having "Multiple 21" fish". So I was pretty much just on cruise control, happy to have a decent limit despite the difficulties I was dealing with.
At our weigh in, I found out that someone had just had allegedly had chances at multiple 21" fish but failed to convert (happens to all of us every trip doesn't it?), and the fishing was tougher than what I'd thought. I ended catching 3 dozen bass on the day, and my biggest 5 went 89.5", which proved to be good enough for 3rd and just a small cull away from winning the thing. Todd was who I watched catch the big one on the buzzbait first thing in the morning, so I was happy to see him win it.
