Lake Lotawana’s Carl Wins Co-angler Division

OSAGE BEACH, Mo. (May 20, 2019) – Boater Adam Boehle of Warrenton, Missouri, caught five bass Saturday weighing 20 pounds, 12 ounces, to win the T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) tournament on Lake of the Ozarks. Boehle pocketed $4,938 for his win in the event presented by Navionics and 250 points in the Ozark Division presented by Bassing Bob standings. The winner of the division’s Angler of the Year title after five tournaments will win $3,000.

“The competition in the Ozark division is some of the best in the nation and to just compete alongside these guys is an honor, but to actually win is quite the feat,” said Boehle, who earned his first career BFL victory. “It definitely feels real good and I’ll be thinking about this tournament for awhile.”

Boehle said he fished from the Glaize Arm of the lake to the dam, throwing a ¾-ounce green-pumpkin-colored Crock-O-Gator Reaction Jig with a Strike King Rage Structure Bug, a 5-inch shad-colored Zoom swimbait and a gizzard shad-colored 6^thSense crankbait.

“I was keying on the shad spawn in the morning, then switched to points,” Boehle said. “I think I had 12 keepers throughout the day, with the majority coming on the swimbait. I made a bait change mid-morning and caught two big ones on the crankbait. I still needed a kicker, so I went flipping with the Crock-O-Gator jig and caught my biggest of the day, a 5½-pounder.

“I need to make sure to give credit to Jim Dill, owner of the Crock-O-Gator bait company,” Boehle went on to say. “My jig order didn’t come in before the event, and Jim was fishing in this event. He hooked me up with a couple of jigs, no big deal. That jig was what I caught my kicker on and turned out to be what won me the tournament.”

.The top 10 boaters finished the tournament in:

1^st:           Adam Boehle, Warrenton, Mo., five bass, 20-12, $4,938

2^nd:          Mark Wiese, High Ridge, Mo., five bass, 20-7, $2,669

3^rd:          Jason Rhyne, Foristell, Mo., five bass, 19-3, $1,646

4^th:           James Dill, Sunrise Beach, Mo., five bass, 18-7, $1,452

5^th:           Cole Findley, Forsyth, Mo., five bass, 18-0, $988

6^th:           Rob Bueltmann, Osage Beach, Mo., five bass, 17-11, $964

6^th:           Lance Williams, Billings, Mo., five bass, 17-11, $964

8^th:           Chuck Austin, Saint Peters, Mo., five bass, 17-6, $741

9^th:           Mike Malone, Lake Ozark, Mo., five bass, 17-2, $658

10^th:        Dustin Lippe, Lampe, Mo., five bass, 17-0, $576

Complete results can be found at FLWFishing.com.

Wes Proctor of Manhattan, Kansas, caught a 6-pound, 3-ounce bass – the heaviest of the event in the Boater Division – and earned the day’s Boater Big Bass award of $745.

Cody Carl of Lake Lotawana, Missouri, won the Co-angler Division and $2,436 Saturday after catching five bass weighing 16 pounds, 15 ounces.

The top 10 co-anglers were:

1^st:           Cody Carl, Lake Lotawana, Mo., five bass, 16-15, $2,436

2^nd:          Lang Yang, Miami, Okla., five bass, 16-7, $1,218

3^rd:          Johnny Ward Jr., Waynesville, Mo., five bass, 16-2, $1,181

4^th:           Brian Abella, Marshfield, Mo., five bass, 14-12, $568

5^th:           Michael Fey Sr., Cuba, Mo., five bass, 14-9, $487

6^th:           Malachi Raymer, Dittmer, Mo., five bass, 13-12, $447

7^th:           Michael Clark, Richland, Mo., five bass, 13-11, $406

8^th:           Lucas Basler, Desloge, Mo., four bass, 13-6, $565

9^th:           James Kelley, Maryland Heights, Mo., five bass, 13-5, $325

10^th:        Morgan McClain, Lenexa, Kan., five bass, 13-1, $284

Ward caught the largest bass in the Co-angler Division, a fish weighing in at 5 pounds, 10 ounces. The catch earned him the day’s Co-angler Big Bass award of $367.

The top 45 boaters and co-anglers in the region based on point standings, along with the five winners in each qualifying event, will be entered in the Oct. 24-26 BFL Regional Championship on Grand Lake in Grove, Oklahoma. Boaters will compete for a top award of a Ranger Z518L with a 200-horsepower outboard and $20,000, while co-anglers will fish for a new Ranger Z518L with a 200-horsepower outboard.

The 2019 BFL is a 24-division circuit devoted to weekend anglers, with 128 tournaments throughout the season, five qualifying events in each division. The top 45 boaters and co-anglers from each division, along with the five winners of the qualifying events, will advance to one of six regional tournaments where they are competing to finish in the top six, which then qualifies them for one of the longest-running championships in all of competitive bass fishing – the BFL All-American. The 2019 BFL All-American will be held May 30-June 1 at the Potomac River in Marbury, Maryland, and is hosted by the Charles County Department of Recreation, Parks and Tourism and the Commissioners of Charles County. Top performers in the BFL can move up to the Costa FLW Series or even the FLW Tour.

For complete details and updated information visit FLWFishing.com. For regular updates, photos, tournament news and more, follow the T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League on FLW’s social media outlets at Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.