Aia 2-15-14

[smbasser]

Anyone know the results?

[Football Head]

16.74 won

[Sprint21fter]

33 boats, 5 limits. 16lbs, 13lbs,12lbs, 2-11lbs bags, 2-8lb bags was the top 7. Our boat was 7th place last place out of a check 8.37lbs-4fish. First spot caught 6 fish in the first hour and 1/2 with 4 keepers, feeling pretty good but knew we needed to upgrade since we fished the Winter Series Championship two weeks prior and there were 4 20 lb bags caught. However, we never had another bite after our 4th keeper bit. We brought our 4 little fish in and to our suprise it was just as tough on everyone else. Everyone was shell shocked, just goes to show you that "you never know until you know" Fish hard and good luck to everyone.

Oh yeah I forgot: We caught our fish on the A-RIG!!!, threw a jerkbait and swam a grub alot as well and never got a bite on those either.

[Quillback]

I heard it was an A-rig or die tournament.

[Alex Heitman]

I fished in the tourney as well and didn't boat a fish all day. We had two nips on the a-rig and that was it. Had just a really bad day. Lost 3 a-rigs and phone is at bottom of lake lol. I fished the entire day until dark and finally had about a 5lber slam my jerkbait right at dark. That was the only consolation of the day lol.

[Bill Babler]

I fished in the tourney as well and didn't boat a fish all day. We had two nips on the a-rig and that was it. Had just a really bad day. Lost 3 a-rigs and phone is at bottom of lake lol. I fished the entire day until dark and finally had about a 5lber slam my jerkbait right at dark. That was the only consolation of the day lol.

Sorry I missed your email. I probably would have not been much help.

[Alex Heitman]

No worries Bill. I know you are a busy guy with the guiding and the lodge you run. Sounds like to me the dam area is a pretty tough area right now from what I have heard. Probably should of went into one of the river arms and maybe would of had a little better luck. I tried everything. I was scraping the bottom with my A-rig off of the long flats into deep water off of the drop. Even was waiting so long on the jerker that the bill was making bottom contact in 15+ feet of water. Was throwing a mcstick and had added a small lead strip that was letting it sink ever so slowly. Varied the jerks and the pauses ever which way you could think of and had nothing to show for it until dark. My only fish at dark for the day really slammed it though. It came off of a gravel bay flat area that had a channel ditch that dropped to 35+ feet. I tied some similar areas yesterday in the morning and ended up with only one barley legal LM. Just super tough for us. Hope it shapes up better with the warming weather.

[Bill Babler]

Greg Wood and Wes Endicott won it. Greg is the Regional Sales Manager here for Phoenix and he called to tell me they had 20 keepers with 45 total fish.

Could not get a big bite. He said he did not expect to get a check with 16 and a half.

Fish bit for them all day, lots of 2.5 pounds K's.

Caught all their fish suspended in the deep trees in the Kimberling City area. Fished trees that the tops were in the 25 to 35 ft. range, counting the A-Rig down to 15 to 20 seconds even before engaging the reel handle.

That is hard, I don't care who you are. I'm just wondering if a guy could have either spooned or caught those fish on a grub, verticle.

[Sprint21fter]

In the right hands person could kill them on a grub or spoon. We are not in that class of fisherman. We came over a school of fish holding deep in channel bend and my partner worked a spoon over with no luck. Turned around and counted a grub down to them and didn't get bit. Partner thought they might be a big school of gar. Normally, if they are bass down there as many of them that we are seeing on the graphs one dumb one will bite. We didn't hold our tongue right.

[Alex Heitman]

Hats off to those guys. I lost 3 rigs doing the deal with the tree tops. Probably should of tried a weed less jig head and would of prevented losing them. I've yet to find one that I like on the rig though.

I did try going after some vertical with the spoon and had nada on that as well. The areas I marked fish just had tons of shad that were down there with them plus the ones that were dying off. Had a buffet in front of them so that was probably the problem.