Canadian Sim 28th and Richardson 88th
by Justin Onslow
FLW PRESS RELEASE
FLW Tour rookie Nick LeBrun is no stranger to
Sam Rayburn Reservoir, but that doesn’t necessarily explain his day one
eruption on the Tour’s first stop of the 2019 season. Abnormally high water
levels at Rayburn this week have all but eliminated the “local advantage” for
the lake’s regulars, but LeBrun still found a way to sack up 29 pounds, 2
ounces to kick off the tournament and pace the rest of the 170-angler field.
 |
| Great start to the 2019 season. Rayburn is flooded and warm. (Photo: FLW) |
The Bossier City, La., native has fished
Rayburn and Toledo Bend perhaps as much as any southern lake. He considers both
to be his home lakes, though his focus for the last month-plus has been on
Rayburn and the Tour’s first event of the year. Still, preparation only goes so
far when a lake’s water level is nearly 10 feet above full pool.
“The lake’s never been this high, and I really
didn’t know what it was going to do,” he says. “Once I knew that some of my
fish (from December prefishing) were still there, I had to spend a day or two
to find out what’s going to be the deal to get them fired up where you can
catch them one after the other.”
LeBrun spent most of the day — and caught most
of his fish — throwing a crawfish color Bill Lewis 1/2-ounce Rat-L-Trap.
He only needed a couple spots to do his damage.
“My marshal said I had a limit in like seven
minutes after I went to the second spot,” LeBrun says. “I probably caught 20
fish today.”
Twenty wasn’t a gaudy total for day one at
Rayburn — several anglers mentioned catching upwards of 60 keepers — but LeBrun
found the right mix of quantity and quality. He did so to the tune of his
best-ever individual limit in a tournament.
And he sure picked a good day to do it.
Sam George – 28-5 (5)
LeBrun outpaced fellow rookie Sam George on
day one, but not by much. The 23-year-old Athens, Ala., pro appeared to be
headed for the top spot at weigh-ins before being bumped to second by LeBrun’s
monster stringer. He finished the day just 14 ounces short of the outright
lead.
“I really—and I know everybody’s going to
think I’m lying—but I really only had one good bite the entire practice,” he
says. “It was on a deal that felt like it had potential, but I really only had
one area that had what I was looking for.”
George ran around looking for similar areas
throughout the day, and he found one at 8 o’clock that produced a near
6-pounder. From there, he continued to roll, filling out his limit and culling
up to his eventual 28-pound, 5-ounce stringer, thanks in large part to a 9-3
behemoth.
“They’re pre-spawn fish, but they’re on a very
specific kind of grass and a break line,” he admits. “I can’t find enough of
it. I found one place in practice that had what I wanted.”
Chad Warren – 25-7 (5)
Chad Warren of Sand Springs, Okla., pulled six
keepers off his first spot of the day and left plenty of meat on the bone for
day one. If conditions hold, there’s a good chance he’ll get another crack at
those same schools of fish on Friday that he opted to leave hungry and biting
on Thursday.
“My practice wasn’t that great,” he says. “I
actually got sick on Tuesday and didn’t even get to fish. I didn’t catch a fish
over 4 pounds in practice.”
As it turns out, you don’t always have to find
them in practice to crack them when it counts.
Jordan Osborne – 25-1
(5)
A 9-pound, 12-ounce monster largemouth helped
propel Longview, Texas, pro Jordan Osborne to a 25-1 finish on day one,
positioning him well within striking distance of the lead entering day two of
the event.
Osborne primarily relied on a Carolina rig, a
spinnerbait and a crankbait to piece together his massive bag, and given the
fact that he’s taking off in the fourth spot tomorrow morning, he’ll have
plenty of opportunities to utilize those techniques again on some of his best
spots. Instead of guarding his honey holes — which Osborne admits was a
necessity on Thursday — he’ll have time to get there first and clean up before
anyone else gets a crack at it.
David Dudley – 24-3
(5)
As should be expected after a top-five showing
on day one of a Tour event, Polaris pro David Dudley is guarded about how he
did his damage on Rayburn. His limit of 24-3, after all, was one of only 10
limits of 20-plus pounds, and the rest of the field should be eager to find out
how FLW’s all-time leading money winner got it done.
Suffice it to say, Dudley “caught them shallow
and deep” with a variety of baits, a near 5 1/2-pounder anchoring the bag.
“It was a grind,” Dudley says. “It really
was.”
A grind to the tune of 24-3 isn’t a bad grind
to be on. Good work if you can get it.
Frog season?
John Cox is called “Tin Man” for a reason.
Sure, it has a lot to do with his choice of wheeling and dealing from an
aluminum rig, but it has just as much to do with his steely penchant for
finding the one shallow-water technique no one else is employing and catching a
bunch of fish with it.
Cox treated day one on Rayburn like
late-August on, well, Rayburn, by tossing around a frog in what could probably
be considered the only true skinny water on the engorged reservoir that is
Rayburn right now. And, both surprisingly and unsurprisingly, Cox caught fish –
16-1 to be exact.
The land of giants
Prespawn at Rayburn is essentially a factory
outlet store for mount-worthy largemouth. Water levels and a mild cold front
did nothing to change that this week.
With a slew of 6-plus-pounders weighed in on
Thursday, the shock value of monster bass lessened with each angler’s turn at
the podium — almost, anyway.
It’s hard not to be shocked by 9-pounders, and
even harder to not be shocked by a pair of 9-pound, 12-ounce hawgs weighed in
by Scott Martin and Jordan Osborne. The duo split the day’s big bass payout
($250 each) and used those fish to put together top 10-worthy bags (Martin sits
in 8th place with 22-2).
Happy accidents
Costa FLW Series stalwart and FLW Tour rookie
Ryan Salzman found a stretch of bank Thursday afternoon that produced scores of
fish, and while most of them were of the non-culler variety, he did land a
4-pounder on that stretch to aid in compiling a 12-13 limit.
He found that stretch — not entirely by
accident — but literally by way of an accident that left him unable to do much
fishing during the official practice session at Rayburn.
“I cut my hand with a pair of scissors and I
couldn’t fish in practice,” he admits.
Salzman didn’t need stitches—he says the wound
was deep but not wide enough to require them—but his sore hand made casting and
reeling painful and not altogether a smart idea. Instead, he spent a lot of
time idling around and marking fish and structure. One of the areas Salzman
graphed was the lucky stretch of bank that produced an abundant supply of
limit-fillers.
Limits aplenty
Of the 170-angler field at Rayburn, only 44
failed to weigh in five fish. Only Rob Jordan (53rd place) weighed in fewer
than five fish and still finished day one inside the top 100 places.
In total, 1,869 pounds and 3 ounces of fish —
all of which made it to weigh-ins alive.
Top 10 pros
1. Nick LeBrun – Bossier City, La. – 29-2 (5)
2. Sam George – Athens, Ala. – 28-5 (5)
3. Chad Warren – Sand Springs, Okla. – 25-7
(5)
4. Jordan Osborne – Longview, Texas 25-1 (5)
5. David Dudley – Lynchburg, Va. – 24-3 (5)
6. Jim Tutt – Longview, Texas – 23-9 (5)
7. Troy Morrow – Eastanollee, Ga. – 22-12 (5)
8. Scott Martin – Clewiston, Fla. – 22-2 (5)
9. Bryan Thrift – Shelby, N.C. – 20-15 (5)
10. Terry Bolton – Benton, Ken. – 20-10 (5)
No comments:
Post a Comment