Brandon Cobb Winns Lake Fork Texas Fest

Brandon Cobb admitted being a little intimidated by Lake Fork Reservoir last week. Ha! Good one. He said the navigational hazards posed by all the timber and stumps along with the potential for having to wind a deep-diving crankbait all day were the basis for most of his unease. As it turned out, timber was the least of his worries and he never made a cast with a big plug. The end result was a darn near perfect tournament at the Bassmaster Toyota Texas Fest for the 29-year-old from South Carolina, who had collected his first Elite Series win last month at Lake Hartwell. After catching a personal-best 31-11 on day 1 at Fork, Cobb's weight fell off to 14-07, but he made up for it with a whopping 37-15 (another personal best) on day 3 before capping off the victory with 29-15 on Monday. His winning weight of 114-00 is the most weight caught by an Elite Series champion since Paul Elias set the four-day weight record with 132-08 at Lake Falcon in 2008.

The victory earned Cobb a second six-figure payday in the matter of a month as well as a berth in next year's Bassmaster Classic. His 11-01 kicker on day 3 wound up being the big bass for the tournament and netted him a voucher for a new Toyota Tundra. It all came about because he was able to apply the mindset he uses back home when fishing for bass that are chasing blueback herring. Fork was a different animal, though. Rather than bass being on virtually every point, Cobb said there'd be a lot of dead water, but when he encountered a spot that had a few fish on it, it was loaded. "There were no fish on a lot of places, but if there was some there, it was a ton," Cobb said. "At home, there will be one or two on just about every point when we're fishing for herring fish. At Fork, 85 percent of the points didn't have fish on them. When you'd find one, there'd be 500 there." He said the bulk of his weight was caught off roughly six spots. Here's a more in-depth look at how he triumphed at Fork.

Practice:

The first day of practice was the first time Cobb had laid eyes on the reservoir that was constructed and developed to be a bass fisherman's playground. He caught a few decent fish that morning by keying on shad spawning around bushes. "I got keyed in on bushes and thought that was going to be the deal," he said. By the second day, however, the a-ha moment occurred after he caught similar sized fish off hard-bottom area and "point-type places." "Then it took me a while, even into the tournament, to get it all figured out," he added. "What had me concerned in practice was I could've had a decent day each day, but it was like I'd get five to 10 bites in a row and then none rest of the day. I think it got better as the week went on with the post-spawn fish leaving the bank. "In practice, I was trying to figure out the timing of it all and when I needed to do it or when I needed to move. In the tournament, I started to understand when I needed to be somewhere and by day 4, I knew where I needed to be and when."

Cobb said he initially tied on a jerkbait in practice at the urging of roommate Shane Lehew, who said he'd caught a few fish off standing timber with a jerkbait. While Cobb couldn't duplicate Lehew's success, the jerkbait bailed him out on day 1 of the tournament when he couldn't generate any bites with a topwater or spinnerbait. "I hadn't thrown a jerkbait on the shad spawn up until then, but they wanted it," he said. He also thought a swimbait would be his ticket to catching a few of the bigger fish Fork is famous for. It worked on day 1 as he caught his two biggest fish that day on a swimbait once the jerkbait bite tailed off. "I thought that might something for the rest of the week, but I only had two more bites on the swimbait the rest of the week," he said.

Competition:

After a slow start on day 1, Cobb feasted on two shad spawn flurries with a jerkbait, including one that saw him catch a 7-02 and an 8-12 en route to a 31-11 stringer that put him in second place. "I caught them good early and never tried going to the bank," he said. He said as the tournament wore on, he began to understand better when and where he might encounter a flurry, but his reliance on them was a bit scary. "It is, but it's cool because when they started biting it wasn't just on one place," he said. "It seemed like it was lakewide. If I stopped on one place and they were biting, I'd be willing to bet they were biting at other spots, too."

Day 2 proved to be a tougher day across the board and Cobb said the shad spawn flurries were non-existent. As a result, he fished the bank and generated plenty of bites, but lost numerous fish and settled for 14-07 and fell back to sixth. "I could've had 20 (pounds), but I executed terribly," he said. He put two 8-pounders on his scoresheet on the morning of day 3, then saw the shad spawn peter out around 11 a.m., prompting a move to the bank. "I went to the bank to catch a 3 and hoped for a 3 1/2," he said.

He caught a 4-04 on a frog, then came upon what he thought was a 5-pounder on bed. "I was throwing a frog down the bank and I went around a dock and was going to up to the bank on the other side," he said. "I saw her whip around on a deep clump of grass. I told my marshall it looked like a 5-pounder. I pitched at her a couple times and saw her better and then I thought it was a 7." After about 20 minutes, he pitched a Zoom Z-Craw at her and she at it. "When I set the hook, I knew it wasn't a 7," he added. It wound up being a 11-01, the biggest fish of the tournament. Cobb said TPWD officials harvested scales from the fish and will check to see if they can match its DNA to any of the fish they use to breed with.

A 37-15 haul shot Cobb into the lead entering the final day, giving him a realistic chance at a second Elite Series title in the matter of a month. The fact that he caught most of his fish in a manner that is also effective around blueback herring added another layer of enjoyment to it. "It was pretty simple," he said. "The thing that allowed me to do so much better was my history herring fishing." On the final day, he compiled a bag of solid 5- and 6-pounders as he added a walking bait to the jerkbait program in the same areas. "I fished five or six places four times a day," he said. "I ran around a ton, but never stayed longer than 10 minutes on a spot if they weren't biting."

Winning Pattern:

Cobb said the areas where he was getting bites on the jerkbait, he'd have to clean mud off the bill after virtually every cast. "It was so shallow," he said. "They were just hard-bottom places with a little rise on them. Most places, my boat was in 3 to 5 feet and I was throwing up into 8 inches and the fish seemed to be hanging on the edge of the flat spot."

Winning Gear:

Jerkbait gear: 6'10" medium-action Ark Fishing Rods Lancer Pro casting rod, Abu Garcia Revo MGX casting reel, 14- and 16-pound Yo-Zuri Top Knot fluorocarbon, Duel Hardcore Minnow Flat SP 110 (ghost pro blue).

Topwater gear: 7'4" medium-heavy Ark Fishing Rods Invoker, Abu Garcia Revo STX (8:1 ratio), 30-pound Yo-Zuri Super Braid braided line (dark green), various walking baits.

Sight-fishing gear: 7'6" medium-heavy Ark Fishing Rods Lancer Pro casting rod, same reel as topwater, same line as jerkbait (25-pound), 3/8-oz. Ark Tungsten worm weight, 4/0 Berkley Fusion 19 flipping hook, Zoom Z-Craw (tilapia).

BASS Lake Fork Texas Fest Winning Pattern BassFan 5/9/19 (Todd Ceisner)

As hard as he tried, Garrett Paquette just could not generate shallow-water bites on a consistent basis at Lake Fork. Instead, he did the bulk of his damage offshore later in the day and that suited him just fine. "Each day in practice, I gave it a fair shake but I never got it going shallow," he said. "I fished to my strengths, which is offshore." He said the schools weren't terribly difficult to locate. In many instances, white bass were mixed in with largemouth as the latter was preying on the former. "One school was easy to find," he said. "I'd find them mostly on side imaging. I'd be seeing dots and if I felt they were bass, I stood up and threw at them. The lake is so good that a 4- to 6-pounder was in most schools, so if I could find a group there was some quality in there."

His main focus was on secondary points in creeks, in about 10 to 12 feet of water. He tried fishing a bit deeper, but the shallower stuff proved to be more productive. "I don't think more than 10 guys were doing what I was doing," he added. He alternated between a deep-diving crankbait and a slim, paddle-tail swimbait to give the fish different looks. "They weren't summer areas," he added. "They were high, hard spots with shells on them and areas around spawning pockets. There were some pre-spawners and a lot of post-spawners that would stop there for a day or two."

Gear:

Cranking gear: 7'11" heavy-action unnamed crankbait rod, unnamed casting reel (6.3:1 ratio), 14-pound Sunline Super FC Sniper fluorocarbon line, Strike King 8XD (citrus shad, chartreuse sexy shad, green gizzard shad).

Paquette said he reeled the crankbait "as fast as I could" in an effort to mimic gizzard shad.

Swimbait gear: 7'11" heavy-action unnamed casting rod, same reel (7:1 ratio), 18-pound Sunline Shooter fluorocarbon line, 3/4- and 1-oz. unnamed swimbait jig heads, 7" Big Bite Baits Suicide Shad (blue gizzard).

He mixed in the swimbait to give the fish a different look from the swimbait. "It kept them interested," he said.

He also caught a couple fish that counted on a popping frog and a Molix TW 110B Super Sound walking bait. "Those kept me from spinning out in the mornings," he said.

Bassmaster Texas Fest Lake Fork 2-5 Patterns BassFan 5/14/19 (Todd Ceisner)

Much like tournament winner Brandon Cobb, Micah Frazier said his mindset at Lake Fork was similar to that of when he fishes blueback herring lakes like Lake Lanier in his native Georgia. One thing he didn't do for Texas Fest was make a trip to Fork ahead it going off limits. He said he's adopted a new approach when it comes to practice and so far he's liking the results - a 42nd at Winyah Bay represents his worst finish. "I'm really happy with the fact that I've give up pre-practice this year," he said. "I've tried to show up and get on a current pattern and not worry about what I found a month ago. It works better for me that way. We get three days and what you get on is current and nothing is stale. I've started to realize you don't have to know every inch of the lake. You just have to find a few good places or a good pattern and you can have a great tournament with very little knowledge."

He said that description applied perfectly to Texas Fest. He said he talked briefly with fellow Elite Series angler Steston Blaylock, who has guided at Fork, about how the bass typically behave in the spring, but beyond that Frazier was shooting blind. "I felt like the shad spawn would be a player," he said. And it was. Frazier devoted virtually his whole tournament to one arm of the lake and zeroed in on shallow, clay points with stained water on them. "It was a similar vibe to back home because shad spawn fish get on those (points)," he said. He caught a few keepers on a square-bill crankbait and a jerkbait, but it was only after the topwater bite, his dominant pattern, started to fade.

Gear:

Topwater gear: 7'3" medium-heavy Abu Garcia Fantasista Premier casting rod, Abu Garcia Revo STX casting reel (8.0:1 ratio), 40-pound Sunline SX1 braided line, Heddon Super Spook (Okie shad).

Bassmaster Texas Fest Lake Fork 2-5 Patterns BassFan 5/14/19 (Todd Ceisner)

Like Paquette, Card stuck with an offshore program at Fork and came away with his second top-5 finish in the BASSFest/Texas Fest event (he was runner-up at Lake Texoma in 2016). When the 2019 Elite Series schedule was released, Card's immediate thought about Texas Fest at Lake Fork was that he'd be all in on the offshore bite. His first impression during practice ran contradictory to that, but it eventually came back around to his initial instincts. "After day 1 of practice, I'd idled for four to five hours and saw very little," he said. "Then I went shallow to see what was there and had an amazing day up shallow. Day 2 of practice was another amazing day shallow. I could catch 20-plus pounds easily." On the final day, he figured he needed to recommit offshore and he started to see more fish the more he looked. "I found three schools and even more during the tournament," he added.

He went into the tournament with a combo pattern mindset, knowing conditions would dictate which direction to go. "I'm pretty surprised at how many fish were still shallow," he said. "It was kind of a shocker and it made the offshore bite tougher, which might've given myself and the few guys who were out there more free reign." He spent just a couple hours offshore on day 1 and hauled in more than 25 1/2 pounds. "It was the strangest day 1 because I thought for sure I could catch low to mid 20s within hours," he said. "We had that bad thunderstorm and that shut down the shad spawn and backed off some spawners.

"I started on my best offshore spots and they didn't fire. I went shallow and at 12:30, I had 11 pounds. I said, 'I need to get back offshore.' I almost killed the whole day up shallow." Rain and clouds on day 2 made it tougher to duplicate that bite, but he still managed 21-04. "On day 3, for whatever reason, the fish were still grouped up, but they weren't acting weird," he said. "I idled over them and they were close to bottom, but they wouldn't fire on a crankbait."

As a result, he caught two keepers that day dragging a jig. "On the offshore places, they are areas similar to how they set up on the TVA chain," he said. "It was a pretty clean bottom, but instead of river ledges, it's more like Douglas (Lake) with long, tapering points and humps. The drop-offs helped, too." He said the depths varied, but most of his deeper fish came out of 15 to 23 feet. "The key was finding bait and white bass," he noted

Gear:

Cranking gear: 7'11" heavy-action Abu Garcia Veritas Winch casting rod, Abu Garcia Revo MGX casting reel (6.4:1 ratio), various deep-diving crankbaits.

Topwater gear: 7' medium-action Abu Garcia Veritas casting rod, same reel (8.0:1 ratio), 40-pound Yo-Zuri Super Braid braided line, Yo-Zuri 3DB Pencil (bone).

Wacky-rig gear: 7' medium-action Abu Garcia Fantasista Premier spinning rod, Abu Garcia Revo MGXtreme spinning reel, 15-pound Yo-Zuri Super Braid braided line (hi-viz yellow), #1 VMC weedless neko hook, 5" Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits Senko (Bama bug).

He relied on the wacky rig throughout practice and during the tournament, he threw it areas he felt bass were bedding, but the clarity didn't allow him to see them.

Bassmaster Texas Fest Lake Fork 2-5 Patterns BassFan 5/14/19 (Todd Ceisner)

Even with several years of experience on the FLW Tour under his belt, Jeff Gustafson is still learning some of the ropes when it comes to largemouth fishing in different regions of the U.S. Lake Fork was quite the classroom for him as he departed Texas having caught the biggest limit of largemouth of his life (27-07 on day 4). "Practice wasn't awesome, but I got a taste that there was a bit of a shallow thing going on," he said. "The deeper thing was happening. I think, in two weeks, the weights would've been bigger. They're just starting to get out there." "I missed the boat in practice on how good the shallow bite was in the morning. The biggest thing over the last few days was taking advantage of that." He weighed in two fish each day caught off shallow points in the morning before moving offshore to fish with a scrounger head and a fluke-style bait. "It was a fun first hour the last three days," he said. "I caught a bunch of fish and that set the tone and took some pressure off. Fishing offshore can be stressful because you're not catching a lot and you're waiting for the flurries."

While the shallow bite was strong during practice, a pre-tournament storm brought the water level up and put a lot of stain in many of the areas that were loaded with fish. That prompted Gustafson to look elsewhere early on day 1. "In any of these, I do better fishing off the bank," he said. "I'm just stronger doing that." When he got offshore, Gustafson said barren, clean points with 8 to 12 feet of water on them seemed to hold more fish than the ones strewn with timber. "They were pleasant to fish, too, because you're constantly getting hung up otherwise," he said.

Gear:

Shallow water gear: 7'6" medium-heavy G. Loomis GLX spinning rod, Shimano Exsence 3000 spinning reel, 15-pound PowerPro braided line, 15-pound unnamed fluorocarbon leader, 3/0 Owner offset worm hook, 5" Z-Man Scented Jerk ShadZ (pearl).

Gustafson would wait for the fish to show themselves on the surface before firing off a cast. He worked it back rigorously, popping it out of the water on the retrieve. "The more commotion the better," he said.

He initially tried a walking topwater bait with treble hooks, but after losing a big one, he opted for the single-hook presentation. "It's a really good bait for hook-up ratios," he said.

Offshore gear: 7'5" heavy-action G. Loomis GLX jig & worm casting rod, Shimano Metanium casting reel, 20-pound unnamed fluorocarbon line, 3/4-oz. unnamed scrounger jig, 7" Z-Man Scented Jerk ShadZ (pearl).

Crankbait gear: 7'11" heavy-action G. Loomis GLX flip & punch casting rod, Shimano Bantam MGL casting reel (6.2:1 ratio), 20-pound unnamed fluorocarbon line, Lucky Craft SKT Magnum 110 Mag MR square-bill (crack blue).

Bassmaster Texas Fest Lake Fork 2-5 Patterns BassFan 5/14/19 (Todd Ceisner)