Bradley Dortch Wins 2017 Walmart FLW Tour Harris Chain with 72-09lbs!

JT Kenney 2nd with mega limit
by Rob Newell

FLW PRESS RELEASE

Rookie FLW Tour pro Bradley Dortch of Atmore, Ala., seems to have a knack for the postspawn time of year when bass are retreating off beds and headed “out” to their late spring haunts. Last May, Dortch won his first Costa FLW Series event on Lake Wheeler by putting himself in front of bass that were leaving beds due to rising temperatures and falling water.

Dortch surpasses Cox and Kenney with rattle bait.
(Photo: FLW)

Dortch used that same postspawn strategy during the FLW Tour event presented by Ranger on the Harris Chain to take home his first Tour win Sunday with a five-bass final day limit of 22 pounds, 2 ounces that pushed his four-day total to 73 pounds, 9 ounces, good for a 1-pound, 13-ounce margin of victory over runner-up JT Kenney.

“I don’t know what to say, this is crazy,” Dortch says. “This is something I’ve been dreaming and working toward for years. It’s a dream come true – I can’t even believe I won it.”

After an unseasonably warm winter where Harris Chain bass got a head start on the reproductive process, the FLW Tour arrived just in time to catch the tail end of the spawn. While others took the headlines early in the event by sight-fishing, Dortch bet that the postspawn train would be coming down the track if he just waited them out at stations located on the outsides.