Learning to Be a Tournament Angler (Part 2 of 3)

[josh]

This time I decided to be in charge of the boat and signed up for an open tournament. Called my fishing buddy and he said that he would fish with me. We pre-fished the day before for about 3 hours. This was just to find a pattern. It took us about an hour to do so. This was after my partner caught a 4.5lber and I lachted on to a 6lber and a 2.5lber. We also caught about 6 short fish. We were pretty happy with what we had done. Tournament day the winds were 180 degrees from the day prior (20 +), outside air 20 degree colder and water temp 2 degrees colder. We started out on main lake points, but the wind was to much for my 17 foot boat. Moved to the Rip Rap, secondary points, and then back to where we found the fish. We caught one fish that we could weigh-in. We placed 134 out of 269 boats. We had the smallest bag of the day.
What I learned from this type of angling was I enjoyed it a little more. It cost me less than the BFL to fish and I had control of the boat. I fished with someone I know can catch fish. I just can't get him to switch to a Kistler rod.
I am going to try one more type of tournament angling, the bass club. I'll let you know how that goes in a few weeks.

[josh]

Being in charge of your own boat looks like the way to go. check out the results, look at the post " Tournament Results". I do know that without my LTA I would have missed the light bites that most of the fish where giving. The sensitivity of those rods is great.

[skeeter20i]

It is good to be in charge of the boat, and being able to make the decisions on where to fish. With that being said it is also good to fish as a non-boater when you first start out in tournaments as well. You will learn new areas, and tricks that catch fish. Not all of the guys you get paired with will be like the first guy you went with. I fished as a non-bopater for 3 years before going out as a boater/pro. I contribute alot of what I know now to some of those guys. Bass clubs are also great to be involved in.