2013 Walmart FLW Lake Chickamauga Day 3: Casey Martin has 10 pound Lead over Michael Neal

By Brent Carlton
FLW Press Release

DAYTON, Tenn. – Casey Martin made the drive from Guntersville, Ala., to Dayton, Tenn., with one goal in mind for the final Walmart FLW Tour qualifier of the season – make the Forrest Wood Cup. It was a tall task as the rookie pro sat in 54th place in the standings and would need to make the top-10 cutoff. Now that he’s done that, Martin has set his sights higher – this time on the $125,000 first-place purse.

Consistency has allow Casey Martin to pull
away from the pack.
(Photo: FLW)

Despite a very slow morning on his best spot, Martin stuck it out and adjusted. Earlier in the week Martin shared this very spot with Mark Rose, JT Kenney and Anthony Gagliardi. One would assume without the other three it would be game on. Not so.
“I almost left,” said Martin. “Then I idled around one more time to see if they were still on the graph and they were.”
Martin finally trigged the school with a drop-shot, Roboworm (green pumpkin) and 10-pound Seguar Invizx line, something he hasn’t used all week. During the opening round the fish were crushing his Picasso School-E Rig, 3/4-ounce Omega football jig and Strike King 10XD crankbait. Today, four of his five weigh fish came on the drop-shot, the other on the School-E Rig.

“They didn’t leave, you just have to adjust with them and figure out how to catch them. Today, the key adjustment was switching to a spinning rod and a drop-shot.”
Martin had a few flurries, but described the day overall as a “grind.” Whatever it was, the official result was 23 pounds, 3 ounces, including one that weighed approximately 7 pounds. With one day remaining, he’ll start with a 10-pound lead.
“I never touched my big-fish spot today, the spot I caught the 6 and the 7-11 yesterday. I need to have something saved in case the mega-school won’t fire.”
Martin did visit one other area, but it was vacant. While his lead looks nearly insurmountable, he’s essentially relying on two schools. What he calls the mega-school, is a shell-laden ledge that drops from 15 feet to 25 feet of water.
“I’m going to spend a lot of time on my first spot again tomorrow. I could stay there all day; there are so many fish and seems you get two or three bites every once in a while. But the pressure is taking its toll and they’re getting hard to catch. I think they are getting accustomed to seeing the same thing over and over.”