KISSIMMEE, Fla. (Feb. 23, 2025) – The 2025 Tackle Warehouse Invitationals opener tournament at the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes was a wild ride from start to finish. Up and down the Top 10, young guns and veterans alike caught big ones all kinds of ways, and the results showed off the best of a really talented group.
This Invitationals season appears to have picked up where 2024 left off. One thing remained steady throughout the event, and it was pro Ryan Armstrong of Robinson, Illinois, at the top of the leaderboard. After blasting 29 pounds, 12 ounces to take the lead in Stop 1 tournament on the Kissimmee Chain, Armstrong backed it up again and again, only ever looking shaky late in the mornings before his afternoon bite picked up.
On Day 3, Armstrong weathered the morning, snatched up 16-1 in the afternoon and totaled up 68-6 for the win and an $80,000 paycheck.
Finishing second, pro Drew Gill of Mount Carmel, Illinois, weighed an even 62 pounds on the week. In third, rookie Banks Shaw of Harrison, Tennessee, got his year started off on the right foot with 61-10, and in fourth, bolstered by 28-5 on Day 2, Macon, Georgia’s Joshua Weaver earned another Florida Top 10 with 61-3.
“Fancy” has not been the way to win tournaments in Florida lately. Last week, Robert Branagh basically did one thing to win at Okeechobee, and Bobby Lane didn’t have to get very creative for his win on the Harris Chain . This week, Armstrong continued the trend, locking big line and a big stick in hand and picking apart one area day after day, flip after flip.
Fishing the pads in the mouth of the creek that flows out of Tiger Lake, Armstrong used one of the lesser-fished sections of the Kissimmee Chain to great effect. On the first day of practice, Armstrong toured Kissimmee and found too many people in a lot of it – and some fish on the south end. On the second day, he went to Tiger.
“I didn't know what I was getting myself into running that creek,” he said. “But we ran that creek, and when I came around that last bend, I sat the boat down, and I just started pitching around. Once I got up in there, my rod just started just getting annihilated, fish just jarring my rod like crazy. I didn't set the hook. I just started learning the area, pitching around a little bit, and I just kept getting bites.”
Getting a lot of bites that he thought were big, Armstrong spent some time picking the zone apart, and then he did a lap around Tiger.
“I spent the rest of the day in Tiger going in a circle and I got one bite,” Armstrong said.
After the first couple days of practice, and maybe with the benefit of hindsight, Armstrong realized he’d put together a bit of a pattern.
“Whenever I came in there, I noticed some flow leaving; it was going out from Tiger to Kissimmee, and I knew it was shell bars there. I felt them,” he said. “I had some flow, and I knew it was getting cold. I thought the current was holding them there because of the cold weather. That was my key. And, honestly, I got bites down on the southern end of Kissimmee, and it was it was current-related hard edge, on pads, and they were stacked, so there was a pattern.”
Pattern aside, Armstrong didn’t end up needing his fish in Kissimmee – all that mattered for him was the fish in Tiger. Flipping a variety of beaver-style baits in several colors, he used a 3/4-ounce weight, a 5/0 Owner Jungle Flipping HD hook, 60-pound-test Sunline XPlasma Asegai, an 8.5:1 Shimano Curado DC and an 805 Dobyns Champion XP . With dialed tackle, he combed each patch of pads with an extremely methodical approach. His slow approach was the product of the size of the area, and it allowed him to attempt to line up his flips to bolster his landing ratio.
“I think it was more circumstantial as far as the way the area is set up,” Armstrong said. “It was a small area, so I could go as slow as I wanted and still work the whole area if I wanted because it was so small. There were fish everywhere.”
From there it was a matter of getting enough bites and converting on enough of them every day. When it was all said and done, Armstrong made a monumental win look pretty breezy.
“It doesn't seem real, because winning doesn't happen in fishing at high levels very often,” Armstrong said. “Most of the time [it’s] never for most people. To win is just unbelievably special to me.
“The sport means a lot to me,” he went on. “I literally think about, watch, it’s everything fishing, every single day of my life, regardless of where I'm at or what I'm doing. I love fishing. I love everything about fishing, and to win at such a high level against these guys that are legitimately the best in the world, it's kind of surreal.”
The top 30 pros at the Tackle Warehouse Invitational Stop 1 on the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes Presented by VOSKER finished:
1st: Ryan Armstrong, Robinson, Ill., 15 bass, 68-6, $80,000
2nd: Drew Gill, Mount Carmel, Ill., 15 bass, 62-0, $30,000
3rd: Banks Shaw, Harrison, Tenn., 15 bass, 61-10, $20,000
4th: Joshua Weaver, Macon, Ga., 15 bass, 61-3, $18,000
5th: Keith Poche, Pike Road, Ala., 15 bass, 59-10, $17,000
6th: Joseph Webster, Hamilton, Ala., 15 bass, 58-12, $16,000
7th: Colby Miller, Elmer, La., 15 bass, 53-6, $15,000
8th: Alex Bradley, Wellford, S.C., 15 bass, 53-5, $14,000
9th: Bobby Bakewell, Orlando, Fla., 15 bass, 53-3, $13,000
10th: Jordan Wiggins, Cullman, Ala., 15 bass, 51-15, $12,000
11th: Blake Hall, Rogersville, Ala., 15 bass, 51-4, $10,000
12th: Dustin Smith, Trussville, Ala., 15 bass, 51-0, $10,000
13th: Ron Nelson, Berrien Springs, Mich., 15 bass, 50-8, $10,000
14th: Bobby Lane, Lakeland, Fla., 15 bass, 49-13, $10,000
15th: Kennie Steverson, Umatilla, Fla., 15 bass, 48-10, $10,000
16th: John Hunter, Shelbyville, Ky., 15 bass, 48-3, $10,000
17th: Brody Campbell, Oxford, Ohio, 15 bass, 47-14, $10,000
18th: Mitchell Robinson, Landrum, S.C., 15 bass, 42-6, $10,000
19th: Cal Lane, Grant, Ala., 15 bass, 42-3, $10,000
20th: Hayden Marbut, Birmingham, Ala., 15 bass, 42-0, $10,000
21st: Matt Reed, Madisonville, Texas, 15 bass, 41-12, $9,000
22nd: Jon Canada, Helena, Ala., 15 bass, 41-5, $9,000
23rd: Spike Stoker, Cisco, Texas, 15 bass, 40-10, $9,000
24th: Hunter Mills, Mayfield, Ky., 15 bass, 40-8, $9,000
25th: Keith Carson, DeBary, Fla., 15 bass, 39-7, $9,000
26th: Thomas Wooten, Huddleston, Va., 15 bass, 38-9, $9,000
27th: Flint Davis, Leesburg, Ga., 13 bass, 37-15, $9,000
28th: Paul Elias, Laurel, Miss., 13 bass, 35-4, $9,000
29th: Matt Baty, Bainbridge, Ga., 14 bass, 34-4, $9,000
30th: Andrew Nordbye, Guntersville, Ala., 13 bass, 32-10, $9,000
Overall, there were 143 bass weighing 406 pounds, 1 ounce caught by the final 30 pros on Sunday. The catch included 26 five-bass limits.
The three-day tournament featured a field of pro anglers competing for a top prize of up to $115,000 and valuable points to qualify for the 2025 Tackle Warehouse Invitationals Championship in September. The full field of anglers competed in the two-day opening round on Friday and Saturday in a five-fish, weigh-in format. Only the top 30 pros, based on their two-day cumulative weight, advanced to the final round on Championship Sunday, where they competed for the grand prize of up to $115,000.
The next event on the schedule for 2025 is the MLF Invitationals at Lake Hartwell set for March 14-16 in Anderson, South Carolina.
https://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_123/mlf-kissimmee-22325.html
Major League Fishing (MLF)