Joe Bass 3/11

[Brett Groeteke]

Fished the Joe Bass team tournament out of Ahoys on 3/11. It was a challenging event since it rained, sleeted, and snowed on us the majority of the day, but it was good to be out on the water regardless. Fished the event with my brother, Ryan. We started out trying to catch some deep fish (50ft plus) on a grub that my brother had found the day prior. In retrospect, it wasn't the right choice considering the conditions, but it was too difficult not to try it since he had 3 fish over 4lbs doing it the day before. After trying deep for an hour with nothing to show for it we started hitting some shallow banks. First spot I caught 4 in short order on a wiggle wart, but only had one that would go in the box, a squeaker smallmouth. I looked up and spotted one more tree that I really wanted to hit before we left, one of those perfect cedars that has fallen over and is laying horizontal. I paused my crankbait as I deflected off of it and had a fish annihilate my bait. I set the hook on a heavy fish and felt it take me over the other side of the tree before pulling off. Oh well, off to the next spot, a mixed rock bank that my brother caught three keepers on 2 weeks ago during Webb's event. This one kicked out a couple of 2.5lb largemouths that wanted the crankbait. We were getting bit but not the kind of quality it takes to contend in a spring derby with nasty weather. We tried running back into a creek and I caught one over 3 in a little cut with chunk rock, again on the WW. We then went an hour or 2 with no more bites when I lost one on a jig. It was probably the hardest bite I've ever had. I set the hook on her and as I tried to reel, my wet hand slipped off of the handle twice, resulting in no pressure on the fish and a lost opportunity. Fortunately my brother redeemed me as he caught our biggest fish shortly after off a secondary point. A 4lb largemouth that fell victim to a Bass Pro Shops grub. We culled two more times on the grub before weigh in and ended up with 15.56lbs, a small check, and a boat full of snow. As expected, the weights were high. I believe the top 3 places were over 19lbs so job well done by those guys. 

[magicwormman]

Sounds like you guys caught them pretty good!  It had to be brutal, with the conditions you guys had. Congrats on the fish , as well as braving the elements.

[Brett Groeteke]

Conditions were brutal. I was actually really surprised there were over 40 boats that showed up. I'll actually mention something I think the readers on here would be interested in. Last year I worked with the guys at Bass Pro to design a pair of gloves for fishing in those kind of conditions. We came up with the 100MPH glove that is insulated, waterproof, windproof, and has less lighter fabric around the palm and bends of fingers to provide the best feel and dexterity. They are expensive but worth it if you are going to try fishing in the winter. 

[Champ188]

Thanks for the great report and the tip on the gloves, Brett. As you well know, 15 pounds will do you a lot of good in most TR derbies ... but those old nasty days in prespawn conditions just lend themselves to really big sacks. Still, a check is a check and helps offset expenses. Congrats on a good day.

[Hammer time]

Nice bag, and thanks for the break down of your day, much appreciated!

[Hunter91]

Great report, Brett! Hats off to you and Ryan and the other guys who roughed it out Saturday.

[Wart 57]

Hard to beat the old Wiggle Wart this time of the year.  Good Report !

[Bill Babler]

Brett, hats off from me.  We fished the AIA yesterday and just flat stunk it up.  There were 63 boats and some really nice 15 to 18 pound bags weighed in.  All on an A-Rig.  I have not been catching many fish or getting many bites but the ones I am on have been decent.  5 for 13 to 16 pounds per day.  But again, I've only been catching 8 to 12 fish a day.

We started off with a 3 pounder on a SpinX right off the bat and then it went to heck in a hurry.  That East wind just froze us to death and blew and blew.  We  fished the same type of bluffend pattern I have been on and ended out day with only 4 keepers for 10 pounds  One of our keepers came 65' on the bottom on a bluffend.  We saw her suspended down there and as I  dropped the Ctail grub she started coming to meet it.  She caught it at about 50ft.  We only caught 9 total fish but did hang one up in a tree.  We could see her flashing down there and was a good one but she came unpinned while we were trying to extract her from the forest.  Would have completed our limit, but would not have been good enough to matter.

Most all the big bags came on A-rigs on Bluffends up the White and the James river.  We simply could not hit it right.  Did hear of a back of the creek pattern again on the A-Rig targeting suspended fish in the middle of the creeks on the deep exposed trees.  I did not hear of a single person doing much cranking.  We tried it and I had hoped the moss would be gone, but we mossed up quite a bit in the Shell Knob to Baxter area.  Had also heard of a dock pattern on a very small 3/16 jig, but it was pretty mossy up there doing that also.

Great Job and thanks so much for  posting.

[usa made outdoors]

Great job Brett.  My dad and I fished it too but didn't fair as well and ended up in 23rd.  We had 3 fish for 9.82 but the one bright spot was one that went 5.70 good enough for 2nd big bass.  We started off in the KC area where we caught the big girl on a rig(deep), then worked our way up the white eventually landing in the Kings.  Second keeper came from the Baxter area on a squarebill and the third keeper from the Kings on a Spinnerbait.  Other than the rig fish we mostly ran a shallow pattern that had been producing better LM bites for us recently but on Saturday all those fish shrunk to non keeps.  We were a ways up the King when the sleet started and quickly switched over to a wet heavy snow making it almost impossible to see which rods were laying on the deck. Along with it came a pretty dense fog that had us a little nervous about making it back to KC on time.  Long story short we started the trek back a little after 1:00 and the fog ended up clearing out just before Baxter.  We hit a couple more spots and just couldn't manage any other bites. - Kenny

[Bullshoalscat]

I bought a pair of those mph gloves, figured  their  mph suit is the BEST love the suit, the gloves, not so much, first time I used them running my hands froze. Ended up putting my under armor liners on first and that made a big diff. Would I recommend them? NO