Central Florida Bass Anglers

The Long-Run Pays Off By Nate Bloom As Central Florida fished the 4th Tournament of the year, the Teams were in for a Hot one. A hot bluebird day was expected. Highs reached the upper 90's which made for a long day and an occasional breeze helped. The Club met at Hickory Point early in the AM to be prepared for the HT3 Tournament going out, (did anybody get a count on how many boats showed for that) which was said to have 80 to 100 boats, so we could get a head start on the blast off. By the way, thanks for all the help in the morning, it went very well. There had been lots of talk of good bass being caught in Lake Griffin . That talk proved to be correct. We blasted off close to 6:00am which did get us out in front of the HT3 trail, so that plan worked well. It seemed that a lot of teams ran to the HWY 19 bridge first thing and some toward the Long Run to Lake Griffin for hopes of a big bag. I had a friend tell me to check out Lake Apopka which is like 90 minutes away and I chose not to, I talked with Chip Dover during practice and he said he was told the same thing, to check out Lake Apopka . We should have listened, it turned out to be good advice. 1st Place went to the New Team members Mike Tucker and Tyler Lovelace who made the Long Run to Lake Apopka where the team has been on fish for two months. They fished an area near a spring throwing Rat-L-Traps and spinnerbaits to bag a whopping 27.07 lbs. on a very tough day for most. They had a limit by 9:30 am as a local fisherman was sitting directly on top of their spot. This made the duo cover the outskirts of the spring which seemed to work out well for them. The team caught a 6, 6.99 and then a 7.11 pound hog which was the Big Bass of the day. They caught their fish around mid morning and decided to head back toward the ramp to be on the safe side. The two forgot though was that the Lock Master takes a lunch break between 12:00 and 1:00 pm so the team waited an hour before locking through. Mike said since they caught those big fish early, none were gut hooked, but they had a bad feeling that they wouldn't make it due to the long day of hot weather and the rough ride back. The Long Run paid off, and this is the team's first win with us, so congratulation guys. The team was in 17th place overall going into the day, this should move them up closer to the top 10 with some of the other teams struggling. Great finish guys! 2nd Place goes to the Team of Chip Dover and John Ricketson who also made a Long Run, but to Lake Griffin . The team scored four of the five fish weighed in on Gitem Toads (a black/blue flake) in the Emerald Marsh area. Weighing in a nice bag of 14.97 lbs. They started out in the morning on the 19 bridge fishing for more than an hour, but had no luck so they moved to Lake Eustis to an area Chip had found during practice. Still no luck by mid morning, so they moved into Haines Creek and couldn't get anything going there either, so they continued on to Lake Griffin . They said that they didn't have a bite until 12:30pm and only had seven bass all day. The team made their way back into Lake Eustis where Chip caught the team's last keeper at 3:00pm on a Chatterbait, (that he spent an hour painting and detailing). That keeper put the team into the money; it weighed 5.42lbs. Another great showing you two, this should give the team a commanding lead for Anglers of the Year. Good job and thanks for throwing and mentioning Gitem Baits. 3rd Place goes to the Team of Fay Rowles and Paul Fraunenhoffer who had to use a sub partner because Fay was out. The team also made the Long Run to Lake Griffin and brought in the Big Gun Teddy Sullivan who helped put Paul on some good fish in Lake Griffin , also in the Emerald Marsh area. They caught fish using Flukes and their primary bait being Texas rig worms. It was a very slow bite for them, but the duo caught 15 plus keepers all day and said they had a great time fishing together. Paul had a good smile at weigh-in knowing that their bag of 13.56 lbs. was indeed good enough for 3rd. I thank Teddy for coming and helping Fay out while he was gone, it was good seeing you Ted. Think I'll use you next time on Harris (LOL). Great job you guys Fay will be really happy. 4th Place again goes to the Wood Brothers Dale and Guy. They brought in a 5-fish limit weighing in at 11.49 lbs. The team worked the mouth of the Dead River throwing Toads in some Hydrilla to catch four keepers and then moved to Little Lake Harris in the residential canals throwing spinnerbaits to cull through eight more keepers. This team has been on a much improved season, so look out. This finish for them has moved them into 3rd place in the points race for Anglers of the Year with 655 points. Keep up the hard work you two. Another respectable finish. Recap: Several teams made the Long Runs to find fish and it paid off for most of them (the fuel companies appreciated the business). Five teams weighed in limits, so fishing was tough. Maybe next time I won't mention where the fish are, or will I? Points race continues to get shook up with leaders Chip and John in 1st with 765, Nate and Tom in 2nd with 700, Dale and Guy in 3rd with 655, John and Mike in 4th with 640, and Reid and Hans in 5th with 620. There were three fish that were caught in Emerald Marsh that were tagged by Fish and Game Officers and all were said to be very skinny. Only four dead fish for how hot it was, that's really good guys. Don't forget to keep ice in the live wells as best you can to keep that temp down and add some catch and release chemical, If you don't have this you need to get some. All this does help the fish. That was a good start to the morning with everybody paid up and on the water ready to go. Point of Order, Rich Craig did a fine job calling the numbers, maybe we'll vote that in. Tim Fay gave it up bad when he called me at 11:00am to tell me that he was leaving due to his live well not working, He said he had four fish in the boat for about 9 lbs. The other teams thank you for that! Sorry about your live well, but if that happens call first before you throw out your catch we could have done something. It's a club, were here to have fun and do a little bragging when you can, so call and ask for help first to all others. Thanks to Neal, Chip, Matt, and Club members for making everything run smoothly. See all at Clermont.