Vance McCullough

 

With a $10,000 top prize, Bassmaster has attracted 222 of the nation’s best kayak anglers to compete in the first-ever Bassmaster Kayak tournament on Logan Martin Lake.

Competition will take place on Thursday, one day before the Bassmaster Classic kicks off on nearby Guntersville Lake.

Encompassing about 17,000 at full pool, Logan Martin is not a huge lake to start with. Factor in the lake level, which authorities have held at around 460 feet in spite of flash flood warnings in the area, and the playing field shrinks even more this time of year – full summer pool is around 465.

Will the lake fish small? Well, there may be ‘log jams’ at some launch ramps. “The biggest problem with this lake is the access,” said Jody Queen, fresh off a KBF Pro Tour win. So how does an angler separate from the pack? “Fortunately,” notes Queen, “I have a Torqeedo so I found some water about 3 miles from the ramp. I will have my Side scan on and go cover about 6 or 7 miles tomorrow.”

To pull away from the pack on the leaderboard, if not the water, “Flukemaster” Gene Jensen of YouTube fame plans to be more hardheaded than the fish – or at least, the competition. “I marked 93 stumps on my fishfinder on Tuesday and I’m going to hit all 93 of them before the day is over.” It’s a hurry-up and wait approach for Jensen who used his Raymarine Element’s side scanning feature to mark all those stumps. “As muddy as the water has gotten in the last couple of days, they’re going to pull in tight to cover and they’re not going to go anywhere. The guy that will make 15-to-20 casts to the same piece of cover until he hits the fish in the nose, that’s gonna be the guy that’s gonna be catching them. Everybody else is going to be scrambling.”

Clint Henderson won the FLW Kayak tournament held in conjunction with Cup last August. He hopes to ‘unify’ the title with a B.A.S.S. win this week. He notes the difficulty of fishing against such a big field, but more so the difficult conditions. “We’re all going to deal with high, muddy water. I feel like I’m prepared for that. I’m prepared for it to be crowded too,” chuckled the champ. Henderson is no stranger to fishing in this region. “I’m gonna stick to my strengths; stuff that I know works on the Coosa River when it’s muddy like this.”

The Coosa River is famous for the big, mean spotted bass that swim there. They can produce a tournament win. Henderson is looking for mixed results, as far as species are concerned. “It’s going to take a mixed stringer to win, I think everybody will have a limit of spots, but it’s going to take a kicker or two, largemouth, to take it home.”

One angler who’s going all-in on the bigmouth bite is Kristine Fischer. Among the hottest kayak pros on the planet since last May. Fischer landed a pair of 11-plus-pounders last month. She won’t find that on Logan Martin, but the lady betting on largemouth for the win this week. “I’m gonna tell you right now I’m going for largemouth. I think a lot of anglers can play their strengths on this one. I definitely found my strength. It’s in a small area. I think it’s probably going to get a lot of pressure, so I’m just going to go fishing.”

While Fischer prefers two-day events which “eliminate luck,” she will scorch the earth as she moves during Thursday’s lone competition round. “The nice thing about it is you can burn your spot to the ground. Here, you’re going to want to do that. It will be interesting.”

Queen noted he will watch his electronics, but he expects to find a bunch of bass up in the dirt. “If I see a school of spots, I’ll throw at them, but there are a lot of bass up shallow.”

Consensus is the fish are shallow, but the bites may come slow – a true test of the best. Somebody will outrun, or simply outfish, the crowd.