Chris Johnston Wins 2025 Tackle Warehouse Invitationals Stop 6 Presented by B&W Trailer Hitches!

By Jody White, Invitations Press Release

MASSENA, N.Y. – Technically, the Johnston family is not inevitable on the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario, but this weekend, they looked pretty hard to beat. On Lake Ontario, Cory and Lynn Johnston won the Thousand Island Open out of Kingston – with more than a 5 1/2 -pound average per fish. Meanwhile, running nearly to Lake Ontario every day, Chris Johnston weighed 76 pounds, 1 ounce over three days to win Tackle Warehouse Invitationals Stop 6 Presented by B&W Trailer Hitches in fine style. 

Finishing second (again!) Hayden O’Barr tallied 68-8 on the week, and Banks Shaw, Brent Anderson and Clay Reece all got over 67 pounds, but nobody was really close to Johnston after he sailed through Day 2. The win is Johnston’s second at the FLW Tour or Invitationals level, his first coming back in 2018 on the Harris Chain. For this win, he pocketed $80,000 and burnished his already sterling record on the big river. 

Quick recovery puts Johnston on top 

After making a long run on Day 1, Johnston wasn’t exactly feeling the love from his favorite river early on. 

“I went to some spots that were new to me, to be honest,” he said. “I found them in practice and made a long run to them, and they were pretty loaded in practice. I was pretty excited. And, I had four spots where I thought they were all 4 1/2-plus, and there were five to 10 fish per spot. 

“Some of them were gone, some wouldn’t bite, and the wheels started spinning,” he said. “It was 11:00. I had two hours left to fish. And I’m like, ‘I’ve got to get out of this area.’”

Luckily, Johnston is long on experience on the St. Lawrence, and he had some good backup stuff in the tank. 

“I went to a different section of the river, and I landed on a couple spots, and they were biting every spot,” he said. “I just stayed in the other zone where I caught them at the end of the day, and it produced every day. I probably shouldn’t leave that area again, to be honest.”

TOP 10 BELOW

Drew Cook Wins 2025 NPFL St. Lawrence River!

Cook delivered a commanding wire-to-wire performance, taking the lead early and never letting go.

NPFL Press Release

 It took three days and nearly 700 miles of running, but Drew Cook conquered the mighty St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario, going wire to wire to earn his first NPFL victory and a cool $100,000.

With three calm and sunny days—something rare this spring and summer in New York—the NPFL arrived in Massena at the perfect time, and the anglers capitalized on it. Many chose to make the long run to the mouth of the lake, with some venturing into Ontario, setting new records in the process.

Running nearly the furthest and fishing a different area each day to stay on fresh fish, Drew Cook’s three-day total of 77-6 gave him a 2-11 margin of victory. In second place, Kyle Welcher fought to maintain his Progressive Angler of the Year lead. He spent the first two days in third place before moving up to second today, extending his lead from 5 to 7 points, unofficially, over Patrick Walters, who dropped to fourth. Andrew Upshaw capped off his event with his biggest bag on the final day, finishing in third.

South Carolina angler Patrick Walters finished in fourth with 71-13 and Alabama pro Justin Atkins finished fifth with 71-3.

Both Drew Cook and Jesse Wise shared the big bass honors, each landing a massive 6-pound, 10-ounce smallmouth on day two.

Cook Goes Wire-to-Wire

Committing to Lake Ontario and the mouth of the St. Lawrence River, Georgia pro Drew Cook earned his first NPFL victory with a three-day total of 77-6. He took the Day 1 lead with 27-2, the biggest bag of the tournament, and when most struggled to catch big bags on Day 2, he added 25-8 and extended his lead.

On the final day, Cook returned to the big lake and fished another new area, but it took a bit of time to get going. Once he settled around lunchtime, he got into a “newish” area and started catching fish.

“Today was a grind,” he said. “I had a few good fish, but I had to really keep moving to find bigger ones than the high 3s, low 4-pounders I was around. I fished different areas each day, but today I fished a new area I hadn’t been to yet, and caught three of my weigh fish from it.”

Austin Felix Wins 2022 Bassmaster Elite Series Event On Lake Oahe!

Canadian Chris Johnston 2nd!

Austin Felix of Eden Prairie, Minn., has won the 2022 Guaranteed Rate Bassmaster Elite at Lake Oahe with a four-day total of 71 pounds, 9 ounces. (Photo: Seigo Seto/BASS)

BASS PRESS RELEASE

MOBRIDGE, S.D. — Austin Felix views himself as a well-rounded angler but he loves to fish for smallmouth. So, it’s fitting Felix’s first Bassmaster Elite Series title would involve catching those big, beautiful brown fish.

 

With a five-bass limit that weighed 16 pounds, 3 ounces on Championship Sunday, the Eden Prairie, Minn., native secured the victory at the Guarantee Rate Bassmaster Elite at Lake Oahe with a total of 71-9, earning $100,000.

 

Felix overcame a disappointing Day 1 performance of 14-2 that put him in 34th and then rebounded with the VMC Monster Bag of the tournament at 23-3 that lifted him to second place after Day 2 and earned him an additional $2,000. Felix took the lead on Day 3 with 18-1 and held off a hard-charging Chris Johnston on the final day.

 

“I feel like I have an advantage on a smallmouth event over the field, at least most of them,” the 2020 Bassmaster Rookie of the Year said. “It is my wheelhouse, I would like to think. I had never been here before but when I came here for (pre-practice) it was the most incredible fishing in the world.

 

“I fully expected driving out here that the 23-pound bag would be what you had to have to compete. But, when we got here, these fish have gotten a lot of pressure over the last year.” 

 

While he had close to 18 spots marked, two main-lake points on Lake Oahe produced the bulk of Felix’s weight, one above the Highway 212 Bridge that crosses the lake south of takeoff in Mobridge and one below the bridge. These points had an important characteristic: they dropped off sharply into deeper water and had rockpiles on the bottom.

 

For the most part, Felix’s smallmouth were relating to the bottom or close to the bottom. If he found they were set up on the bottom, he could stay off his spots and cast to them. But on many occasions, they would be constantly on the move and that’s when his Lowrance Active Target came into play.

Casey Smith Wins 2022 St. Croix Bassmaster Northern Open at Oneida Lake!

Canadian Cooper Gallant Finishes 3rd!

By David A. Brown

BASS Press Release

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Returning to a favorite family spot, Casey Smith of Victor, N.Y., found the quality bites he needed to win the St. Croix Bassmaster Northern Open at Oneida Lake presented by Mossy Oak Fishing with a three-day total of 55-13.

A solid start gave Smith a Day 1 limit of 18-7 that put him in sixth place. He took over the lead with a second-round bag that went 18-12 and after sacking up a Day 3 limit of 18-10, he closed the door with a 2-pound winning margin over his fishing pal Liam Blake of Syracuse, N.Y.

Smith won the first-place prize of $52,300 and qualified for the 2023 Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk to be held in Knoxville, Tenn., March 24-26. Bassmaster Opens anglers are Classic eligible if they commit to fishing all three events of the division in which they win.

“I kinda forgot about the Classic; it hit me last night while I was rigging tackle,” Smith admitted. “The priority was winning at home in front of my people. I won a major event on another tour about six years ago, but I wanted to win that trophy at home.”

Smith recalled struggling with a slow morning and midday until moving to a spot that made sense from a fishing perspective but also held deep sentimental value. The Billington Bay shoal with about 3 feet on top and 12 on the sides was the spot where Smith and his wife Tiffany fished seven years ago when they were expecting their son Travis.

Last year, the family spent their Independence Day week in the area and fished the same spot. Today, that bar delivered epic serendipity.

Dube Goes Wire-To-Wire At B.A.S.S. Nation Lead On St. Lawrence

Canadians Dan McGarry 2nd, Tracy Rich Wins Non-boater

BASS PRESS RELEASE

WADDINGTON, N.Y. — After a rocky start, Timothy Dube of Nashua, N.H., regrouped, secured his limit and claimed a wire-to-wire win at the TNT Fireworks B.A.S.S. Nation Northeast Regional at the St. Lawrence River with a three-day total of 62 pounds, 10 ounces.

 

Setting the Day 1 mark with 23-3, Dube added a second-day limit of 21-4. After entering Championship Friday with a lead of 2-1 over Hamburg, N.Y.’s Billy Gilbert, Dube finished with 18-3 and edged Danny McGarry of Newcastle, Canada, by 1-14.

 

Dube won the top prize of $5,500 and qualified for the TNT Fireworks B.A.S.S. Nation Championship, which will be held Nov. 9-11 on Pickwick Lake. The top boater and nonboater from each state and the province of Ontario qualified for the championship.

 

“Eight years ago, I fished my first qualifier and I never thought I’d be here,” Dube said of his win. “I have no words for this.”

 

The first two days saw Dube enjoying remarkable efficiency by catching his four-bass limit on his first four stops. The final round tested him with an early frustration, but Dube was able to overcome the setback and rally for the win.

 

“Today was a struggle; it was the first day all week that I’ve lost fish,” Dube said. “I worked on a big fish that was about 5 pounds for about an hour early in the morning, finally got it to bite, and she came off and disappeared.

 

“I was definitely nervous. I didn’t even have a fish in the boat when I lost that big one and I thought ‘Here we go.’ But I put the train back on the tracks, found some other fish and caught my limit.”

 

Targeting bottom with a rock/sand/gravel mix, Dube caught his fish on a Ned rig with a 3/8-ounce Swagger Tungsten head and a goby colored Z-Man Finesse T.R.D. and a drop shot with a 1-ounce weight, a No. 1 Owner mosquito hook and a white Berkley MaxScent Flatworm. 

 

Day 1 brought mostly sunny skies, but Day 2 saw dimming cloud cover. Sunshine returned for the final round, but while Dube found the brighter day facilitated his sight fishing, the fish seemed to be in a finicky mood.

 

Taku Ito Wins 2021 Bassmaster Elite St. Lawrence River!

Cory Johnston 4th  & Chris Johnston 5th

Ito captures 26lbs final limit and first Elite!
(Photo: BASS) 

BASS PRESS RELEASE

WADDINGTON, N.Y. — Saving the best for last may not have been his intention, but Taku Ito’s eye-popping 26-pound limit propelled the Japanese sensation to a convincing victory at the Farmers Insurance Bassmaster Elite at St. Lawrence River with a four-day total of 90 pounds.

 

Hailing from Chiba, Japan, the second-year Elite placed 38th on Day 1 with 17-15, then improved to 11th with a second-round limit of 22-14. Day 3 saw Ito secure his Championship Sunday berth by adding 23-3 and improving to seventh.

 

Earning $100,000 for his Elite win, Ito anchored his third and fourth days’ limits with 6-pound smallmouth, both of which earned $1,000 daily awards for Phoenix Boats Big Bass.

 

“I love Waddington — I’m very, very happy,” Ito said with the engaging sincerity Elite audiences have come to love. “When I was 8 years old, I won the (Bassin’s Black Bass with Hank Parker) video game and now, on the St. Lawrence River, I won the Bassmaster Elite Series.

 

“Big Bass. Big Stage. Big Dreams. Bassmaster!”

 

Ito, who placed sixth at last year’s St. Lawrence River event, devoted all four days to Lake Ontario. The first two days, he fished rock structures in approximately 20 feet. On Saturday those areas failed to produce, so he relocated to a spot in 26 to 27 feet near Chaumont Bay.

 

Calling this spot “Taku Disneyland” for its abundance of fish, Ito caught his Day 3 limit there and started on the spot Sunday.

 

“I was driving about two hours (each way) and I had about two hours and 30 minutes of fishing time,” Ito said.

 

Arriving at his spot this morning, Ito thought his graph was malfunctioning when he saw what appeared to be a false bottom at 13 to 14 feet. To his delight, it was a massive school of Lake Ontario giants.

 

“Usually, smallmouth are on the bottom, but today there was a school of big smallmouth suspended,” Ito said.

Jacob Wheeler Wins MLF BASS PRO TOUR St. Lawrence River!

MASON PRINCE 

BASS PRO TOUR Press Release

MASSENA, N.Y. – It was a week of record-breaking on the St. Lawrence River for the General Tire Stage Five Presented by Berkley. Fittingly, the beginning of the week in northern New York was dominated by Jacob Wheeler, and it ended with Wheeler setting yet another record on the Bass Pro Tour, winning his fourth Bass Pro Tour event overall and his second in the 2021 season.

The winningest angler in MLF history was able to catch 35 bass for 129 pounds for the seventh MLF win of his career, beating second-place Jeff Sprague by 28-10.

Wheeler’s Qualifying Round Practice Pays off

While the final tally on SCORETRACKER® may seem as though it was an easy win for Wheeler, the Tennessee pro found himself in seventh place after a slow start Period 1 with only five smallmouth for 21-8. As he prepared to start his afternoon, Wheeler made the decision to run to an area he found while practicing during his final Qualifying Round in which he won.

Thanks to a more than 30-pound cushion in that round, the Googan Baits pro was able to scout new areas and find fish for when he would fish in the Championship Round. But not only did he find fish for the future, they were also fish that he knew he could count on because of the area they were located.

Wheeler Breaks Two-Day Weight Record for Group A Win; Robinson & Coulter K.O. KVD at the 2021 Bass Pro Tour St. Lawrence River

MASON PRINCE 

BASS PRO TOUR Press Release

 

MASSENA, N.Y. – It was another record-setting day for Jacob Wheeler on the St. Lawrence River while Stage Four champion Kevin VanDam fell short of a chance to go back-to-back on the Bass Pro Tour. It wasn’t the same level of production for Group A during their second day of fishing in the General Tire Stage Five Presented by Berkley, but the 40 pros competing still caught an impressive amount of fish.

Wheeler Back to His Winning Ways

Wheeler has his name scattered all over the Bass Pro Tour record book, and you can go ahead and etch his name in another spot after Sunday. The Tennessee pro set the MLF record for highest two-day weight total with 66 bass for 222 pounds, 1 ounce, just two days after he set the record for highest single-day weight total with 165-1.

“I was catching bass in all three stages of the spawn today and that’s been my key over these first two days,” Wheeler said. “I caught my fish on a Rattlin’ Ned from Googan Baits on a drop-shot and a Ned rig, those two were the deal for me. It’s been really good out here for me.”

There have been 21 events in the history of the Bass Pro Tour, and Wheeler has now earned a spot in the Championship Round in 11 of them. The Googan Baits pro separated himself from second-place Brent Ehrler by more than 31 pounds and more than 44 pounds ahead of third-place Justin Lucas. Wheeler now has a chance to set another Bass Pro Tour record, by winning his fourth event if he can pull it off on Wednesday.

Chris Johnston Wins 2020 BASS St. Lawrence River with 97-08lbs!

Canadians Cory Johnston 7th & Jeff Gustafson 12th 
By David A. Brown
BASS PRESS RELEASE

Johnston become first Canadian to win an Elite event. He scored 20lb limits
each of the four tournament days.
(Photo: James Overstreet BASS)

His home waters were off-limits this week, but that didn’t stop Canadian standout Chris Johnston from winning the SiteOne Bassmaster Elite at St. Lawrence River with a whopping four-day total of 20 smallmouth bass that weighed 97 pounds, 8 ounces. 

The first Canadian to claim an Elite title, Johnston was the only competitor to break 20 pounds each day. Hailing from Peterborough, Ontario, he placed second on Day 1 with 27-0 and held that position for two more days with weights of 24-12 and 23-0.

Entering Championship Sunday a little more than 2 pounds off the lead, Johnston added a final limit of 22-12 to surge ahead of Connecticut pro Paul Mueller and win by a margin of 1-10. Mueller had led the event all three days going into the final round.

“This has been a crazy year fishing-wise for me; I had two of the worst tournaments probably in my career and to bounce back and win on the St. Lawrence, of all places, is just incredible,” said Johnston, who finished 71st and 59th in the first two Elite Series events this year. “I’ve wanted a big tournament win on the St. Lawrence River bad, and it finally came together.

“I’ve watched Bassmaster my whole life and even if you’d asked me three or four years ago, I didn’t think I’d be here in this position. It’s been surreal. I can’t even describe how cool it feels.”

Throughout the week, Johnston used several baits, including a tube, a Ned rig and a black hair jig. On Sunday, he caught his fish on a drop shot with a green pumpkin Berkley Flat Worm. He needed a 3/8-ounce tungsten weight for proper presentations on Lake Ontario, where steady 6- to 8-foot waves made everything more difficult than it had been the three previous days.

The first two days saw Johnston plucking early keepers from a rocky point inside the river and then moving out to fish Lake Ontario rockpiles in 20 to 40 feet. On Saturday and Sunday, he did the majority of his work in the Great Lake.

2020 FLW Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit Super Tournaments Lake Chickamauga Day 3: Wheeler Regains Leads with 72-06lbs!

Wheeler's 25-12lb limit secures lead
by Sean Ostruszka

FLW PRESS RELEASE

Despite culling error and 2lb penalty,
Wheeler still holds 4lb lead
(Photo: FLW)

He may be the best in the sport right now. He’s on his home waters. And he’s got a near 5-pound lead going into the final day after crushing the biggest bag of the tournament, unofficially.

Can anyone catch Jacob Wheeler?

If today is any indication, the only thing that may stop him from winning the Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit Super Tournament on Lake Chickamauga is himself. Wheeler caught fish early and often, and he sent a jolt through the live coverage when he cracked a 10-pounder – only to give back two of those pounds due to a penalty for making a cast with six fish in the box. Still, his 25-12 official weight for the day was by far the biggest bag of the day, and his 72-6 overall weight has set him up for his second major victory on Chickamauga.

“Going out there today, I knew I had my work cut out for me,” says Wheeler. “These guys are unbelievable; great fisherman. I knew I needed a big bag, and I was very fortunate to catch that big fish and anchor that bag.”

After watching some giant bags get brought in by Jason Reyes and Cole Floyd on Wednesday, Wheeler mentions that in order for him to make a run at winning this event, he’d have to do the same at least once over the final two days. He didn’t waste much time. 

Andrew Upshaw Wins 2019 Costa FLW Series Championship on Lake Cumberland!

2^nd Cumberland win for Upshaw in 2019

by Curtis Niedermier

FLW PRESS RELEASE

He did it again.

Fog delay and bluff walls key to win for Upshaw.
(Photo: FLW)

For the second time this season, Andrew Upshaw is an FLW champion thanks to consistent days spent targeting big Southern smallmouths. The Tulsa, Okla., pro won the 2019 Costa FLW Series Championship on Lake Cumberland in Burnside, Ky., with a three-day total weight of 42 pounds, 15 ounces. The win comes less than seven months after Upshaw won the FLW Tour event on Cherokee Lake in east Tennessee.

“I’m just going to call it blind luck,” says Upshaw about his recent string of success on smallmouth fisheries. “And I’m glad to have it, to be honest with you.”

Complete results

Upshaw calls it luck, but his recent performances say otherwise. He’s actually a smallmouth fanatic, and it showed this week.

“For the duration of my Tour career, we’ve fished enough smallmouth fisheries that I’ve kind of learned how they set up and stuff like that,” he says. “The other thing is, one of my favorite places to fish in the country is Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie. I really love catching smallmouth up there. Now, they set up totally different up there, but that love for smallmouth drives me to learn how to catch them in other places.”

Like up north, the smallmouths down here are aggressive fish. Upshaw had that in mind as he formulated a game plan. He knew that if he was going to win with smallmouths, he needed to find a pattern that would get him a lot of bites. Cumberland is full of fish, so if he wasn’t getting bit consistently, he wasn’t on a program that could win. 

He eventually found the right stuff down on the reservoir’s lower end.

“What I figured out was main-lake transition bluffs, but it had to have the river channel swing on it – true river-channel swings,” Upshaw says. 

The best transitions started at 45 to 50 feet deep adjacent to the wall and shallowed up to 22 to 24 feet deep. 

“Right where it started slightly flattening out, that’s where they’d be sitting,” Upshaw says. “I had about 15 spots, from about Conley Bottom down. Some of them didn’t ever fire like they did in practice, and some did better than they did in practice.”

Upshaw figures a lot of these fish are already in or near their wintertime holes. Some might eventually shift over to the deeper water near the bluffs, but others will stay put. More fish were transitioning into these areas during the tournament, which meant he had new bass coming to him. He was on so many fish that, yesterday, Upshaw actually left them biting after multiple culls for ounces. He was consistently on more fish than his fellow competitors, and by getting more bites, he eventually was able to assemble limits of the quality fish needed to win. 

Micah Frazier Wins 2019 Bassmaster Elite St. Lawrence River with 87-4lbs!

Johnston falls to 2nd, 1 pound short. 

By James Hall

BASS PRESS RELEASE

Ned rig key to Frazier's massive last day limit.
(Photo: BASS)

The great smallmouth battle of 2019, also known as the Berkley Bassmaster Elite at St. Lawrence River presented by Black Velvet, came down to a rookie Canadian pro who has spent his life plying the pristine waters of the storied fishery and a young Georgia pro who is experiencing a breakout season.

Chris Johnston of Peterborough, Canada, was the favorite leading up to this event because of his history on the St. Lawrence. Micah Frazier of Newnan, Ga., wasn’t on the radar of anglers who may finish in the top half of the field. As the scales settled in Waddington, N.Y., these two prolific pros held their breath alongside thousands of fans waiting to see which of these anglers would wear the crown.

And by just 14 ounces, Frazier toppled the overwhelming favorite. The Georgia pro’s massive 25-pound, 9-ounce limit on Day 4 vaulted him from 10th place to Elite Series champion, completing a four-day total of 87-4.

“I had no idea I had that much weight,” Frazier admitted. “I’m terrible at judging smallmouth. Still, I felt like I had an outside shot at winning as long as the leaders didn’t crush them.”

Frazier caught bass all day long. His culls were countless, and the big fish kept on biting his bait. That bait, the only one he used all four days of the event, was a prototype Yum Ned Dinger fished on 1/4- or 1/8-ounce mushroom jigheads. “I don’t think the bait is out yet, but it mimics a goby better than anything I’ve seen. It has a hollow section in the tail that makes it stand up and it bubbles a little when you shake it.”

Frazier’s pattern was simple. The Georgia pro focused on areas 18 to 40 feet deep, keeping his line perfectly vertical under the boat while drifting with the current. “I’d seen some light sand spots and there were a lot of mussels and shells there,” he said.

Frazier’s win puts an exclamation mark on a breakout season. The soft-spoken pro has been fishing the Elite Series since 2016, but this year has captured two third-place finishes (Toyota Bassmaster Texas Fest on Lake Fork and the Bassmaster Elite at Lake Hartwell) along with his win on the St. Lawrence.

“This year has been so special. The atmosphere on the Elite Series now is just incredible. All the guys are positive and I have never had so much fun fishing as I have had this year. B.A.S.S. and Bassmaster fans are just awesome.”

2019 FLW Tour Cherokee Lake Day 3: Andrew Upshaw Close to Win with 52-04lbs!

Spawning smallmouth key to top anglers.

by Justin Onslow

FLW PRESS RELEASE

Upshaw almost there!
(Photo: FLW)

Andrew Upshaw is one day away from going wire-to-wire to secure his first-ever FLW Tour victory, and as long as the pressure and the nine pros behind him don’t knock him off course, the Tulsa, Okla., pro has a game plan to make it happen.

The Tour’s fifth event of the season, presented by Lowrance, has been a slugfest to this point. Cherokee Lake in eastern Tennessee is showing out, and while total weights aren’t what would usually constitute a “slugfest,” the sheer volume of keeper bass the field has landed this week is nothing short of extraordinary.

Behind Upshaw, a stacked top 10 looms large. Only 1 pound, 10 ounces separates the three-day leader from Tour vet Tom Monsoor, and Upshaw is only 4 pounds, 15 ounces in front of Tim Cales, who sits in 10th place entering Sunday.

With so many anglers catching tons of fish – and so little margin for error – Upshaw has already started feeling the pressure. Fortunately, he has a safety net to help calm him down.

“To lead wire to wire is just crazy … It’s indescribable,” Upshaw admits. “Where I’m at right now, I’m trying to keep it all together, but in [the weigh-in] line I felt like I needed to throw up every five seconds.

“As far as nerves go, I’ve dealt with high-stress situations before – not just in tournament fishing but football and basketball and everything like that. Tomorrow I get to go have fun. I’ve got my family here to calm me down so everything should be fine.”

Upshaw’s family made the trip from Oklahoma on Friday after he started piecing together another nice bag and after already having secured the day-one lead. As it turns out, their presence could make the difference between a strong top-10 finish and his first Tour win.

Despite the boost his family’s arrival gave him, Upshaw started to feel the pressure Saturday when his bite started slow and he began the day with a trio of fish that weren’t long enough to throw in the box.

“I pulled up where I wanted to start, and I caught a non-keeper immediately, and that’s only my second non-keeper of the week,” he explains. “A few minutes later I caught another non-keeper, and then I caught another non-keeper. It really started spinning me out a little bit.”

Upshaw admits his game plan was inherently “high-risk, high-reward,” due in part to fishing an area that was susceptible to wakes from passing boats shortly after takeoff. Fishing for bedding bass, he needed some calmer water to keep those fish on their beds and ready to protect them.

Paul Mueller Wins 2019 BASS Elite on Lake Lanier with 69lbs!

Canadian Chris Johnston 10th. 
By David Precht
BASS PRESS RELEASE

Mueller's first Elite a family celebration.
(Photo: BASS)

Former B.A.S.S. Nation Champion Paul Mueller proved he belongs in the big leagues of professional fishing by winning a spotted bass shootout on Georgia’s Lake Lanier. Mueller earned $100,000 by winning the Toyota Bassmaster Elite at Lake Lanier today.

Desperate to fill out his five-bass limit with bigger spotted bass, Mueller returned to a deep ridge that had produced most of his big spotted bass on previous days. There, he managed to dredge up two big spotted bass that pushed him ahead of Texas angler Chris Zaldain by less than a pound.

“I struggled today,” Mueller said. “I had run out of options, so I went back to my primary spot and caught a 5 1/4 (pounder) and then a 4. Without those two fish, I don’t win.”

Mueller had 18 pounds, 8 ounces for the day, giving him a four-day total of 69-0. It could have been even more. “There were still fish on that spot when I left,” he added. “At the end of the day, I lost a couple of big ones. I could have had a 20-something bag today.”

He described the structure as a large, underwater ridge with two shallower areas on top and very deep water on each side. He caught most of his spotted bass the first day on a Reins Bubbling Shad on a Do It Molds Freestyle Jighead, but the big producer the rest of the time was a 3 1/4-ounce Reins Fat Rockvibe Shad Swimbait on a 1/2-ounce herring head underspin jighead with the spinner removed.

“Who would have thought you could win this tournament — a blueback herring tournament — off of one spot?” he said. In fisheries where the nomadic herring are a main staple of bass diet, spotted bass are notorious for leaving their holding areas unexpectedly and en masse.

That happened to Zaldain, who also had to contend with a wind shift today that moved his schools of bass. A sudden drop of temperatures into the low 40s didn’t help.

“I fished long, sloping points all week and had to switch to western banks today because of the east wind,” he said.

Zaldain was the leader with 51-9 going into Championship Sunday, when only the Top 10 finalists competed, but he fell short with a 16-9 limit today that included two smaller bass. He alternated between a 3-inch Megabass Spark Shad swimbait on a 3/8-ounce jighead and a 3/8-ounce drop shot with a 3-inch Megabass Hazedong Shad.

Unlike Mueller and Zaldain, the others in the Top 5, and most of those in the Top 10, fished crankbaits in shallow to medium depths, especially on shorelines and points in 38,000-acre Lake Lanier.

Keith Combs of Texas finished third with 66-1, earning a $20,000 payday that pushed him into the Millionaire’s Club of B.A.S.S. His career earnings now stand at $1,001,635. He alternated between Strike King crankbaits and a 6-inch shaky head worm and followed a “run-and-gun” pattern to try numerous spots during the day. “I didn’t stay anywhere long,” he said.