Hometown legend in the making.
By Luigi De Rose
As the scales settled on the FLW CUP on Wheeler Lake,
Alabama on August 7th, the 2016 Walmart Tour season came to a
close. John Cox was declared champion
but there is another champion who was bolting back home to continue his bass
tournament season in Canada. Chris Johnston, of Peterborough, Ontario had
concluded his rookie season on tour. We caught up with him to discuss his
fantastic season and his 8th place finish at the FLW CUP.
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| Chris Johnston 2016 FLW TOUR Rookie of the Year. (Photo: FLW) |
IBASSIN: Thanks for taking the time out to chat.
Chris: No problem we are just about 40 minutes from the
Canadian border.
IBASSIN: You had an amazing FLW CUP! Let’s talk a bit about
it the championship and how you fished.
Chris: I am surprised that I did so well. I had a very poor
practice. I was expecting to flip trees to get the better bites and I did get a
few fish but it was random. The first couple of practice days I could get about
5 to 6 bass a day. I was worried that I couldn’t get a limit each day. The deep
bite wasn’t there. I got nothing out deep.
On the third practice day, I found a point that had some
schoolers but many of the fish were very small. Some were only a few inches
long but there were a few 2 pounders mixed in. So, I determined that I would
get a few schoolers each morning then try for the flipping fish.
What I discovered was that the schooling bite got better
throughout the day. That is something you shouldn’t figure out during an event
but in practice so I got a bit lucky. On Day 1 of the tournament I determine
that bite was stronger than what I imagined it would be.
IBASSIN: FLW had pictures of you with some big smallmouth.
Did you catch them mixed in with the small schoolers?
