Russ Lane's primary target was mussel-beds close to deep water that had bright, green milfoil close by. Average depth was 10 to 12 feet, although he had two places that sounded at 17 feet. He noted that he thinks he caught a mix of resident and migratory fish.
"Some of the fish were already out there on their summer places, but on some of those shallower places - the 10-foot places - I caught fish that were obviously post-spawn. And I caught some big old fat females that I don't know for sure, but they sure looked like pre-spawn fish that were just pulling in." He said he caught a lot of fish on a crankbait, but many of his better fish came on a 3/4-ounce Buckeye Lures football-head and a Big Bite Kriet Tail Worm (Texas- and Carolina-rigged).
Cranking gear: 7' medium-action American Rodmsiths David Fritts Cranking rod, Abu Garcia Revo STX casting reel, 12-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Flourocarbon. His cranks included a Lucky Craft R.C. 3.5DD (sexy-shad-type), Strike King Series 6XD (sexy shad), Xcalibur Fat Free Shad (citrus shad) and Spro Little John.
His jig was a 3/4-ounce Buckeye Football (black/blue) tipped with a Big Bite Dean Rojas Fighting Frog (black/blue).
His worm was the 10" Big Bite Kriet Tail Worm in plum.
Main factor: "Covering as much water in practice as I could and trying to find as many schools of fish as I could. I just kept pushing and pushing and pushing. I'd go hours and hours without finding a school, then all of a sudden I'd hit one, mark it and keep going to find another."
Performance edge: "The Bass Cat Jaguar with the new Yamaha SHO. In that 22-foot boat, I could run around those couple of days when it was real windy and still cover a lot of water. And I could run faster than most guys. That engine hardly eats any fuel and I was just able to put it all together in that rig."
Guntersville Patterns 2-5 May 12, 2010. Bassfan.com (http://www.bassfan.com/news_article.asp?id=3610).
Japan's Morizo Shimizu communicated his pattern information to BassFan through a translator. He said his primary pattern was cranking main-lake, mid-depth ledges. He added that a friend traveled to see him from Japan, and the only way the friend could see him fish was if he made the Top 12 cut. After Shimizu made the cut, all his stress melted away and he was able to relax and fish on the final day. "I just wanted to show big mamas to Alabama fans," he added.
Jig gear: 7'3" heavy-action CastAway Crankbait gear: 7' medium-action Evergreen International rod, Shimano reel, 14-pound Sunline FC Sniper fluorocarbon. His cranks included a Strike King Series 4 and an Evergreen Combat Crank 320. Both were chartreuse/white.
John Crews caught more than 90% of the fish he weighed on a bait he designed - the Spro Little John DD. He worked depths from 10 to 18 feet, always with the goal to grind bottom. "I was fishing different places," he noted. "A couple were places that I knew about from the past, and a couple were (new) places I found in practice. Most places I was fishing - there was a school of fish there.
"The funny thing was those schools weren't always on the exact same place. Sometimes they'd be 50 yards over here, sometimes 50 yards over there. So you had to fish around to find out where they were. But once you got them fired up, it was every cast a lot of times."
He struggled to find a common thread that connected his best spots. Some areas were "real subtle," he noted, "and not very different from what else was around it." Other places were related to the river channel. Most of them, however, were hard-bottom spots with a little drop. "I don't really know what held them in some of those places, and there was no grass on any of them."
Crankbait gear: 7'10" medium-action JB Custom Rods The Missile crankbait rod, Daiwa Zillion Crazy Cranker reel (4.9:1), 12-pound Vicious fluorocarbon, Spro Little John DD (cell mate).
Main factor: "I'd say it was that I kept moving until I found a school. It looks easy, because once you get them fired up it's every cast for 10 to 15 minutes, but you have to work to find them - crank hard and cover a lot of water. I located probably six or eight schools before the tournament, and ended up catching fish out of most of them."
Performance edge: "I think it was the Little John crankbait. You can launch it - cast it a mile - and you can use that one bait to fish from 10 to 18 feet. You don't need a 16 to 18 foot bait and a 10 to 12 foot bait, because once you get to the 10 foot depth range, you can still crank it like heck and it'll just dig the bottom and come straight back to you."
Davy Hite's best school was going strong up until the end - it disappeared sometime overnight immediately prior to day 4. The result was a disappointing day-4 bag that dropped him to 2nd. Overall, he had two types of fish going - deeper river-ledge fish, as well as, fish along a creek channel.
He's not sponsored by Strike King, but he was one of the pros throwing the Series 6XD. That was his primary bait, but he also threw a 12" Gary Yamamoto worm and a mop-style jig.
"I had several things going and they kind of faded away," he said. "What was ironic was I talked all week about fishing where the fish were going to, not where they were leaving, and trying to stay ahead of them. I did that up until (day 4). There was a huge school of fish that I left that were biting every single cast (on the first 3 days). They moved away. That's just the way it is."
About his best two places, he noted: "One was on a main-river ledge, another was back in a creek. There was no grass - both of those were structure-related. The ledge was in 12 to 14 feet, and the creek (spot) was 8 to 10 feet."
Cranking gear: 7'2" medium-action All Star cranking rod, Pflueger Patriarch casting reel, 12-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Fluorocarbon, Strike King Series 6XD (sexy-blueback-herring and chartreuse-sexy-shad). He had Pflueger specially gear his Patriarch's at 5:1. On day 4 he was fatigued and did throw a little with an Abu Garcia Revo Winch.
Main factor: "I was just trying to predict which way the fish were heading. I was fishing out on that river-ledge stuff and creek channels. When we first got here Monday, there was a tremendous amount of fish up shallow and spawning. Guys caught them throughout the tournament, but the biggest migration was headed out to those ledges."
Performance edge: "Probably my Humminbird electronics with Side-Imaging, topo mapping - the whole 9 yards. Electronics on a place like this are huge. You can't be competitive without them, and Humminbird's Side-Imaging is by far the best."
Guntersville's a regular Elite Series stop, so Reese was already more than familiar with the waterbody. In fact, he finished 2nd here last year. "I didn't do anything different this year for practice, other than having to find new water," he said. "The stuff I caught them on last year - it wasn't a factor at all. I think that had to do with the lack of a shad spawn.
That just totally changed everything. So I had to look for new water and kind of start over this year. "I looked at the shallow stuff, and I definitely looked deeper for a long time too," he added. "I had shallow fish and some deep schools that at least clued me into needing to find (more) deep stuff. Most guys were concentrating on 10 feet or less."
By the end of day 2, one of Reese's schools was "pretty much gone." By day 3 quality bites thinned considerably. On day 4, a few of his spots had replenished as the wind died and the water cleared, and he was able to catch an early 5-pounder. After that, though, he "just relaxed and went fishing" and visited stuff he hadn't touched much or at all yet.
"I just fished around," he said. "I wasn't getting much. I could still catch a ton of fish, but nothing over 2 pounds. Then there was one of the bridges where I caught some good ones in practice. Every time I went there during (the tournament), it had a couple of our guys camped on it."
"There were still three local boats there - fishing around," Reese noted. "I came up and cranked the stuff I wanted to crank. I had that mop jig, and that's where you're supposed to throw it. So I threw it out there and jacked one about 4 1/2 pounds, then another about 4 pounds and then a 3 1/2. It worked pretty good. I tried running other bridges but never got a good bite."
About where his best schools were located, Reese said there seemed to be no common thread. The fish were simply on some spots and not on others. "There was no grass involved, but I guess hard bottom as a whole was the key. Every one of my spots was so different, so it's not like I had this constant pattern going. I had a bridge, a jetty on the main river channel, a deeper shell bed, a river ledge with scattered stumps and rock, and also that bridge I used the last day. "It was interesting because there wasn't really anything consistent to all the schools of fish."
Crankbait gear: 7'10 Wright & McGill Skeet Reese Magnum Crankbait rod (glass), Abu Garcia Skeet Reese Revo, 10-pound Berkley Trilene 100% Fluorocarbon, Lucky Craft R.C. 3.5DD (splatterback). His mop jig was homemade and he also weighed some fish caught on a Rapala DT16.
Main Factor: "I think (on day 4) it was just a matter of fishing the conditions. Just being able to make good decisions at the right time to get that extra bite or two during the course of the tournament."
Performance Edge: "I don't know. I think everything's a part of it, from the line to the bait and rod. It all plays a part. And electronics Ð my Lowrance was huge when structure-fishing, and I could stay on waypoints with the GPS, especially when the wind was blowing."
Guntersville Winning Pattern Winning Pattern May 11, 2010. Bassfan.com (http://www.bassfan.com/news_article.asp?id=3608).
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