Well, I fished the ATX Bassmasters tournament on Lake Travis yesterday and ended up with mediocre results finishing right in the middle of the pack. Overall, I’m satisfied with how I fished, but a few events during the tournament have left me with some thoughts and lessons to chew on. I say that I’m satisfied with how I fished because I felt like I made mostly good decisions and I was on the fish needed to win. I caught my limit, which I’m always happy about, but unfortunately, I lost a few fish that very possibly could have culled out some of the smaller fish I had in my limit at the end of the day. The more and more I fish tournaments, the more and more I realize how vitally important it is to be what I call “mechanically perfect.” More often than not, the difference between first place and second or third place is one fish. Whether it is one big fish that helped put a guy to the top, or whether it’s one fish that the guy in second place lost. The difference is usually one fish. With that same line of thinking, in my case during yesterday’s tournament, the difference between first and finishing in the middle of the pack… was a few fish. I lost three fish yesterday, and I’m sure at least one of them would’ve upped my weight, if not all three of them.
Basically, what I mean by being mechanically perfect is that in order to consistently win tournaments, you need to operate almost as a well maintained machine. This includes hundreds of aspects when it comes to putting together a flawless tournament. My flaws yesterday rested on two things:
1) Two of the bass I lost yesterday were lost fishing a drop-shot rig in water over 40ft deep (that’s fishing really deep in the bass fishing world). I believe I lost those fish because I was using a rod that was too short and too soft of action for that type of fishing. That resulted in poor hook-sets. I knew the rod was too short and too soft, but out of laziness and not wanting to re-tie a different rod, I used it anyway. The shorter rod doesn’t pick up as much line as you sweep the rod up to set the hook, and the ultra light action of the rod had way too much give for fishing that deep. You also have to consider that I was using monofilament fishing line and that stuff stretches an inch for every foot of line. All bad combinations. Bad decision on my part to stick with using that rod…
2) The third fish I lost was a result of what I believe was a dull hook. I was throwing a shaky head and had caught several fish on it already. After unhooking one fish, I noticed that my hook point was beginning to look a little dull, so I pulled out my hook hone to sharpen it. After sharpening it, I noticed that the hook was starting to look like it had been sharpened one too many times and was going to be impossible to restore a good sharp point on. I thought I should probably tie on a new one and throw this one out, but the frugal part of me wanted to try and push it. I continued using it and that’s when I lost the fish. Needless to say, after losing it, I tied on a new one and threw out the dull one. However, I should have done that immediately when I realized I wasn’t going to be able to sharpen it. While some shaky heads might be a little pricy, this one was not. It probably cost me less than 10 cents. I should have thrown it out. Stupid decision…
I think that being mechanically perfect is continually a learning process. At least I can check off a couple more things that will help me get there…
Leave a Reply