Ok, since I last posted I have fished 2 days of the Champlain tournament. The first day I weighed 9.4lbs and they were all smallies. My partner had an 18lb bag with all smallies also (the biggest bag of all smallies on day 1). I caught my first 3 on a Yamamoto 4" cut tail that I got free a couple of years ago, it was some kind of dark smoke with silver/blue flake. Then my partner stated kicking my ass with this bait he had. It was so bad I give in and got one of his bait and commenced to lose a monster smallie but even then he would hook one and I would cast back to the same spot ASAP and never get bit then he would cull cast back to the same spot and hook another. Needless to say with 1 hour to go I was figuring 3 was it, then with 10 minutes left I caught a good 2 3/4 and a 12 1/2" to fill the limit.

After we got back to the motel I asked my partner if I could have the baits off the floor, so I took them and he gave me the rest of the pack we were using out of. I am so glad he let me have them because the second day I caught another limit all on the worms he gave me. The limit was smaller, 7.14lb, but it was enough to give me 17.2 for the tournament and I made the top 50 cut in a tie for 39th.

Now comes the part I am proud of. My partner for day 2 was a guy named Jeff Cannello, great guy but he got on something late the first day that made my job of catching "A" fish the second day really tough. He was fishing bouy's.................. yes that is what I thought. He found some nice smallies under the bouy's in the shade and he was going to point the boat at the bouy and when he was done I could have a shot.

We are boat 3 and the storm/rain just starts, I am talking buckets of rain. I am prepared with suit on and fish hedz keeping me to where I could see too bad it is raining so hard it is coming in behind the fish hedz so I have no clue to where we are going. All of a sudden we stop at the inlet to the inland sea indle through and then stop at the next bridge and shuts off the engine. I kind of start getting excited since I might actually get to fish something beside a damn bouy. Well the wind is blowing so hard under the bridge he ties us to it and why in the hell he does this I have no clue but leaves me the down current/eddy side of the pilling. I grab my drop shot and run to the side of the boat before it moves and make a drop litteraly straight down. I get a bite but it feels like a rock bass very next drop, again straight down, I set the hook a 3lb smallie and fight, fight, fight, fight the damn thing tilll I could grab it (I didn't want him to know I caught one so that I could maybe get another drop before he wises up). After about 5 more cast I get a close keeper largemouth and a couple cast later I set the hook and lose a 2lb smallie and then the dry spell starts. I think my next bite came at 1:30 after the bouy screw job ended and we were hidding under a bridge from the rain. Now I have 3 and in all rights I am tickled to death. He has this idea to run up this creek that seems like it is 100 miles away because of the wind. We get to the creek idle atleast a mile to fish under a fucking bridge, I have no clue don't ask me why but he does catch a keeper smallie. Then after about 20 minutes of fishing the same spot under the bridge we leave the whole damn creek passing willows, docks and a bunch of lay downs.......... needless to say I am pissed about the long run to fish "A" spot. We come out of the creek with an hour and a half to go and start the damn bouy job again.

At the first bouy I dick around and catch a good 2lb smallie then 4 bouys later I get a close keeper smallie giving me my limit, YES!

Glad the day is over, see ya later, Mike

 

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