Native New Yorker Jamie Hartman spent much of his life within a two-hour drive of Cayuga Lake and had competed there many times over the past decade and a half, but didn't have many accolades to show for it. He even lists Cayuga as his "least favorite lake" on his BassFan profile. A couple of top-6 finishes in BFLs in 2011-12 were the highlights from his time on the venue. "It's been my nemesis," he said. "Many times I had incredible practices and just horrible tournaments."
A lot of those bad memories of the place were washed away on Sunday as he claimed his second Bassmaster Elite Series victory of the season at Cayuga. Back-to-back bags weighing more than 22 pounds allowed him to eclipse Jeff Gustafson, who'd led after days 2 and 3, by 10 ounces. He averaged just over 20 pounds per day, finishing with an 80-13 total. It was his ninth single-digit placement in just 24 career Elite Series starts and he joined Brandon Cobb as two-time winners this year. Following are some specifics on how Hartman approached a venue that was familiar to him, but which he previously didn't hold in high regard.
Had to Go Green:
Hartman's lone objective during the three-day practice period was to locate the best grass on Cayuga. "The lake was weirded out because of the long winter, cold spring and high water," he said. "The weather was horrible all spring - no sunshine, constant rain - and it put things way behind." Good-looking grass was relatively easy to find in the southern end of the lake and he pinpointed a few stretches that were teeming with quality fish.
"It was like taking candy from a baby, it was so easy, but something happened before the first day of the tournament and they weren't there like they had been. Luckily I'd found a place on the north end where I'd caught one fish, so I settled into that area and started dissecting it. "It was really in the middle of nowhere. There's really no contour on the north end, but 13 feet is the depth I like this time of year and I was able to find grass in that range. It was probably only 200 yards long, if that, and 60 to 70 yards wide. It was mostly coontail with a little bit of eelgrass mixed in with it. It wasn't superb, but there weren't a lot of places on the lake you could say that about."
Competition:
A dropshot rig and two crankbaits produced all of Hartman's weigh-in fish for the event. He couldn't see holes or other irregularities in the grass, so he made random pitches with the long-leadered dropshot, covering as much of the grass as he could. He made long casts with a medium-diving crankbait to tick the tops of the grass, which rose 7 or 8 feet from the bottom, and made more precise throws with a deeper-diving model. The 36 1/2 pounds he caught over the first two days kept him in contention, but not among the leaders. He joined that fray with the deep-water bite toughened in the third round and his day-best stringer moved him up 12 places to 4th. That bag was highlighted by a 6 1/2-pounder he caught late in the day after venturing off his main area.
His second catch of the final day was a bruiser of that same size and set the tone for his victory rally. His stringer, the biggest of the day by almost two pounds, also contained a 4 1/2-pounder and a trio of heavy 3s. With a big crowd cheering him on at the weigh-in in Union Springs, N.Y., he took the lead with three anglers still remaining in the bag line. He held off Seth Feider and Chris Zaldain, and then exulted when Gustafson came up a little more than half a pound short.
"I dug myself a big hole on day 1, but I put my head down and kept grinding," he said. "This is what I've worked so hard for. "A lot of it came down to patience - I knew when I picked the dropshot up that this thing was going to take time. The fish weren't bunched up at all and I had to pick the whole place apart. I could catch a couple of good ones and then go hours without another bite, and that's the way it was every day."
Winning Gear:
Dropshot gear: 7'4" medium-heavy Cashion John Crews Signature Series dropshot rod, Shimano Stradic 2500 spinning reel, 10-pound HI-SEAS braided line (fluorescent yellow), 10-pound HI-SEAS 100% Fluorocarbon leader, 2/0 Owner All-Purpose worm hook, 3/8- or 1/2-ounce cylindrical dropshot weight, Riot Baits Synth (green-pumpkin/neon).
He increased or decreased his weight depending on the intensity of the wind.
He dyed the tail of the Synth chartreuse to enhance the neon effect.
Cranking gear: 7'6" medium-action Cashion DD rod, Lew's BB1 Pro casting reel (6.2:1 ratio), 15-pound HI-SEAS 100% Fluorocarbon, out-of-production medium- and deep-diving crankbaits (shad).
BASS Elite Tour Cayuga Lake Winning Pattern BassFan 8/28/19 (John Johnson)
Canadian Jeff Gustafson, one of the few anglers in the entire field who avoided grass beds entirely, absolutely destroyed deep-dwelling largemouths on each of the first two days. That bite dissipated on day 3, and although he still held the lead after that round, he didn't have enough left on the final day to hold off Hartman. He was 12th at the St. Lawrence River the previous week and the runner-up showing pushed him up to No. 32 on the Angler of the Year points list - well inside where the Bassmaster Classic cutoff will eventually fall. That was at least a bit of consolation in the wake of his inability to close out the win after starting the final day with a 4-05 advantage. "It was a pretty good two weeks," he said. "I'm in good shape for the points now."
He started practice experimenting with a variety of grass-oriented techniques and ended up catching half a dozen fish in the first couple hours, but nothing over 2 pounds. He also tangled with about 30 pickerel during that span. He marked a couple of fish on a point in 18 to 20 feet of water and employed a Ned Rig to entice a 2 1/2-pounder. He roped a 3-pounder from the next point, then a couple of solid keepers off a sunken brush pile. From then on, he was on the hunt for structure-related fish. By the time practice was complete he had several largemouth areas near the launch on the north end of the lake and some smallmouth on rock piles down south.
A football-head jig was his primary bait for the first two days. The Ned Rig filled that role on the weekend when his action slowed. "I was just fishing my strengths," he said. "When I come down for these tournaments and I can use my Humminbird electronics, that's what I do best. If I have to beat the bank, I'm not as confident."
Jig gear: 7'5" medium-heavy G. Loomis NRX 893 rod, Shimano Bantam MGL casting reel (7.5:1 ratio), 15-pound Seaguar InvizX fluorocarbon line, 3/4-ounce homemade football-head jig (green-pumpkin), Z-Man Z-CrawZ trailer (green-pumpkin).
Ned Rig gear: 7'3" medium-action G. Loomis NRX 873 rod, Shimano Stradic K 2500 spinning reel, 10-pound PowerPro braided line, 10-pound Seaguar InvizX fluorocarbon leader, 1/4-ounce Z-Man Finesse ShroomZ jighead, 4" Z-Man Hula StickZ (green-pumpkin).
BassMaster Elite Tour Series Cayuga Lake 2-5 Pattern BassFan 8/30/19 (John Johnson)
Chris Zaldain now has three finishes among the top 3 on the season. He spent this event focused on deep water (25 to 35 feet) and adjusted accordingly when his best area transitioned from a place where he could catch quality largemouths early in the day to one where big smallmouth bit after the sun got high in the sky. A swimbait attached to an underspin head was his most effective weapon, supplemented by a Neko-rigged stickbait. "I said from the get-go that I was going to have to put each day together as it unfolded," he said. "I didn't have one school that was really good; I had to visit several spots and those spots changed with the weather, but sticking with the offshore bite was a big key for me."
"Every time the alewives showed up, it was game on. White perch and yellow perch were feeding on the alewives and the bass, whether they were green or brown, were eating the perch. There'd be a whole food chain taking place and it was something I had to keep a close eye out for." He came within 2 pounds of claiming his first full-field Elite Series triumph. "I haven't given it away at any of the tournaments I've had a chance to win this year. It's just the someone's always caught them a little bit better."
Underspin gear: 7'4" Megabass Destroyer Brigand rod, unnamed 3000-size spinning reel, 15-pound Seaguar Smackdown braided line, 12-pound Seaguar Tatsu fluorocarbon leader, 1/2-ounce Santone Z-Spin head, 4.2" Megabass Hazedong Shad (moroko).
"The think I like about that head is it's got a longer arm than normal and it keeps the blade away from the belly of the swimbait," he said. "The largemouth and the smallmouth both ate it."
On day 4, when he brought only smallmouths to the weigh-in stage, he used a Megabass Spark Shad swimbait (lemon shad) on a 3/8-ounce ball-head jig. He threw that on a Megabass Destroyer Addermine rod with the same reel and line.
Like Gustafson, David Mullins waylaid a bunch of deep-dwelling, 4-pound-plus largemouths over the first two days. He experienced the same fate at the runner-up on the weekend - those bites just went away. He caught 19 of his 20 weigh-in fish on a crankbait. The other, a 5 1/2-pounder, was enticed by a worm and was his biggest fish of day 2, when he caught his heaviest sack. "I knew they eat a crankbait on that lake; I'd caught them cranking before, but never like this time," he said. "I didn't know it would be this good."
He used the plug to pull fish from water as deep as 28 feet on day 2, but the majority of them came from 12 to 15 feet. "The biggest thing for me was using the Garmin LiveScope," he said. "It wasn't too hard to find the grass lines, but I could scan them with the LiveScope and find the isolated clumps on the outside and that's mostly what I fished. "Two of the fish I weighed (on day 4), I watched them eat the bait on the LiveScope. If I wouldn't have seen them on the screen I'd have kept reeling and made another cast, but because I saw them, I stopped the bait as it was coming up and they came and ate it. Both were 3-pounders.
Cranking gear: 7'11" unnamed rod, unnamed casting reel (5:1 ratio), 12-pound Sunline Super FC Sniper fluorocarbon line, Strike King 5XD (green gizzard).
He replaced the bait's stock hooks with No. 3 Owner STXs.
Worm gear: 7'3" heavy-action Doomsday Tackle 'The 47' rod, unnamed casting reel (8:1 ratio), 18-pound Sunline Super FC Sniper fluorocarbon, 5/16-ounce Scottsboro Tackle tungsten weight, 4/0 Owner Jungle Flipping Hook, prototype Doomsday Tackle Magnum Worm (roku).
Seth Feider loves to flip grass and that technique was at the forefront of his mind when he arrived at Cayuga. However, he was a bit disappointed when he got his first look at the lake's vegetation. "The grass didn't look as good as I'd thought it would," he said. "There was only about five or six good stretches of milfoil - a lot of it had been cut and a lot of it had been sprayed (as part of control efforts by governmental agencies). "With there not being that much of it, I thought there would be more guys on what was there, but I had pretty much everything I wanted to fish to myself."
The long stick accounted for all but one of his weigh-in fish - the oddball came from a dock and bit a jig. "The most important thing I did was just committing to the grass," he said. "Unless you fully commit, it's not going to work out. It's not like pulling up to a rocky point and catching one after another. You could easily go hours or miles between bites in practice." He used two flipping setups - one for heavier grass and one for more sparse vegetation.
Light flipping gear: 7' medium-heavy Daiwa Tatula Elite Brent Ehrler Signature Series rod, Daiwa Steez CT casting reel (8:1 ratio), 30-pound Sufix 832 braided line, 20-pound Sufix Advance fluorocarbon leader (9'), 5/8-ounce Outkast Tackle Stealth Feider Jig (black/purple or money craw), BioSpawn VileCraw trailer (black/purple or green-pumpkin).
Heavy flipping gear: 7'3" medium-heavy Daiwa Kage rod, Daiwa Tatula SV casting reel (8:1 ratio), same line, 1/2-ounce Woo Tungsten weight, 4/0 VMC Ringed Wide Gap Heavy Duty hook, unnamed tube-style bait (green-pumpkin).