Posted  June 28th, 2008  8:05 pm CST

Kevin Wirth Goes Shallow To Earn His First Elite Series Win

Story by Brent Conway - Photos by Mark Jeffreys and Matt Pangrac

Hendersonville, TN – For the second straight tournament, the final day was steeped in suspense as the event had essentially boiled down to a two horse race. Just as it was at the Bluegrass Brawl, this week, the Tennessee Triumph has been all about Kevin and Rick – although this time it was Kevin Wirth and not Kevin VanDam.

Veteran Missouri pro Rick Clunn was essentially the model of consistency this week, and with a three-pound gap to fill when the day started he had his hands full not only in trying to chase Wirth down, but continue to milk a stretch of water that had begun to show sings of stress on Saturday. Clunn, along with two thirds of the Top 12, ran nearly 70 miles up river to the isolated creek channel he’d been milking to attempt to complete the Hail Mary.

At launch, Randy Howell was closest to unseating Clunn, but still had over four pounds of ground to make up to do it…and a monumental three additional pounds to catch the tournament leader Kevin Wirth. Just three ounces behind Howell was Dean Rojas who’d been fishing in an area near the Wirth since the start. 

Granted, at the start of the day catching the leaders posed substantial odds, but just as it has been said since before the tournament started, winning at Old Hickory – where quality bites are incredibly hard to come by – will come down to one key bite. It’s been proven all week that it is entirely possible to catch them good one day and fail to catch a limit the next. 

Bill Lowen made a hard charge in an attempt to catch Wirth but ultimately ended the tournament in second place with 50-05 overall after bringing in the heaviest bag of the final day weighing 14-09. Third-place honors went to Randy Howell who weighed 12-15 on the day to boost his four-day total weight to 50-00.

Dean Rojas finished the tournament in fourth place with 48-12 after bringing in a five-bass limit weighing 11-14. Rick Clunn ended the tournament tied with Alton Jones in fifth place with a four-day combined weight of 48-12. Jones brought in another healthy five-bass limit weighing 12-03, while Clunn crossed the stage Sunday with just four bass weighing 7-0 to fall short of claiming his first Elite Series win for the second straight tournament.

1st Place: Kevin Wirth
Winning an Elite Series event is never easy. Winning wire-to-wire is almost unheard of, but Kevin Wirth did the unthinkable by doing just that. Based on his findings from practice, Wirth knew that the ledges weren’t the deal for him – which is saying a lot when considering he’s one of the best deepwater structure fishermen in the game. 

“When I saw what was going on the first day of practice, I knew that I couldn’t sit out there and look at all these guys grouped up fishing ledges,” Wirth explained. “I called the dams and they weren’t generating any water whatsoever, which plays a huge role in ledge fishing. Right then, I decided to run 70 miles in the other direction and do something that I’m not really that comfortable doing.”

Outside his comfort zone, Wirth admitted that he wasn’t really sure what he had until the first day’s weigh-in. “I wasn’t getting as many bites (up shallow) as everyone else was claiming to be getting, but they were all quality,” he said. “By the end of the first day, I knew that I’d found something really special and it just reinforced my hard-headed approach to this week.”

Wirth noted that while he’d lead the event since the start – thanks largely to his first day’s 17-pound bag (the largest of the tournament), he knew that Sunday he still had to catch them to secure the win. As a result, the final day had its share of tentative moments. “Today was a lot of tougher than any other day of the week,” he described. 

“I didn’t get nearly as many bites as I’ve been getting because of the cloud cover, but I did manage to get lucky and get one big bite.”

However, even though he had managed a key bite and another keeper to compliment it, Wirth lost a big fish that he felt sure would be his undoing. “I set the hook as I saw him swimming away with my bait,” he said. “When I turned him the hook just came unbuttoned. I was a wreck.”

Fortunately, Wirth was able to put the lost fish out of his head and focus on what he needed to do and boated another keeper shortly thereafter. It was at that point, with three keepers in the box, that he made a critical decision. “I decided to abandon my spot and run to a secondary area,” he said. “The second piece of structure that I made a cast to, I caught a three pounder. 

“That was a really pivotal fish for me because it gave me four fish with a couple of hours to go.”

Wirth explained that his weapon of choice all week was a seven-foot flipping stick teamed with a 6.4:1 ratio Revo XTS reel – both critical factors in his success. “Some of these fish would bite, and you might not feel them, and by the time you realized it they had move 10 feet,” he said. “You had a lot of line to pick up in order to put a hook in the fish. Without that high-speed Revo, I would have been handicapped.”

“Picking up that buzz bait for the first time all week in my final stop of the day was a great decision,” he allowed. “It not only finished out my limit, but it also gave me my biggest fish.”

With the exception of Roumbanis’ shallow-water frog win, the year has seemingly been dominated out deep. So the irony of Wirth’s shallow-water win doesn’t escape the deepwater specialist. “My strength, obviously, is structure fishing so you wouldn’t have convinced me that I’d win shallow in a million years,” he said. 

“I figured out that the bluegill and shad were spawning during in practice, which was really the whole key to finding keepers, and I just made up my mind that come hell or high water, I wasn’t going back to the ledges.”

Wirth explained that his stubbornness – more than anything else – is what kept him shallow and away from his comfort zone. “About the third day of practice, I just told myself that I was going to put one rod in my hand and be stubborn and stay with it,” he said. “Being stubborn is what got me win, plain and simple.”

With his first Elite Series trophy in hand, Wirth freely admits that it’s been a long hard grind to get to this point in his career, which hasn’t been without a certain measure of doubt. “This win means everything,” he said. “14 years is a long time, and there’s been many a day where I would ask myself if this is the right thing to be doing. 

“Right now it’s all been worth it though – just keeping my nose to the grindstone and staying with it has finally paid off.”

Key to the Win: “I just think telling myself every single day of the week to just go fishing and have fun regardless of the outcome was a huge factor in my success this week.”

2nd Place: Bill Lowen
Bill Lowen started the week inside the Top 12, and over the course of the grueling four-day event he remained true to his goal of fishing to his comfort zone. “The whole key to my success this week was giving them something different to look at,” the Ohio pro explained. 

“From the beginning of practice, I felt like since this lake gets so much pressure that anything I could do to be different would work to my advantage.” 

Lowen, when given the option, will 100% of the time seek out areas of the lake that resemble the Ohio River where he cut his teeth. Lowen found an area 60 miles up river that was identical to his home waters, and he set out to completely go against the grain of conventional fishing wisdom. “People always tell that when the fishing is tough, you’re supposed to downsize,” he explained. 

“I went the total opposite direction and upsized everything – line, rod, baits…everything.”

Going against what textbooks would call a “finesse opportunity,” Lowen attacked his shallow-water areas with either a 10-inch Berkley Power Worm or a five-inch Berkley Power Hawg. “I just feel like fish in pressured lakes get accustomed to seeing tiny baits thrown at them,” he said. “Because every magazine talks about throwing finesse in the summer on high-pressure lakes, that’s what we’ve all be trained to do. 

“By picking up a big worm or creature bait and going against the grain, you’re going to give the fish something they’re not used to seeing and they’ll react to it a lot better in most cases.”

As much as any other factor, Lowen admits that not having any preconceived notions of Old Hickory allowed him to be so unconventional. “I didn’t know anything about this lake before we got here,” he said. “I knew it was a river system, so I just attacked it like I would the Ohio River back home and went fishing in the ugliest water I could find.”

Alternating between two key areas for much of the week, Lowen said that the depth his fish were positioned in was also very unconventional for this time of the year. “I was fishing so shallow this week that it really blew my mind,” he said. “I could flip that 10-inch worm in and actually see the tail (of the worm) floating above the water. Pretty soon it would swim off. It was unbelievable.”

In hindsight, the only change Bill would make on the week is having a re-do of the third day. “I screwed up bad Saturday by fishing too fast,” he said. “I was more worried about getting to a spot that I’d been saving rather than slowing down and picking my best water apart. 

“I’m pretty sick about that, but hindsight is always 20/20. I had a great tournament, and really can’t get too stuck on that one day.”

3rd Place: Randy Howell
As The BASS ZONE has said throughout the week, Randy Howell has had luck on his side since the first day when he dumped a three-pounder that he caught in a spool of monofilament. Sunday, Lady Luck was again on his side. “I actually thought for a little while that I was going to be able to do (pull off the win),” he said. 

“Everything was just clicking for from the minute I got into the boat. I just had a blessed day.”

Howell explained that he scrapped everything he’d been working for the first three days of the tournament on a whim. “I went into Drake’s Creek today because I saw it from the road when I was driving to the ramp this morning,” he said. “I just had that feeling that I wanted to go fish it, and within the first couple of casts I had a three-pounder.” 

With the feeling that he’d stumbled onto something really special after catching his limit by 7:45 (the earliest by far for him this week), Howell said that he never left Drake’s on the final day. “I haven’t really had a good spot all week, but just sort of junk-fished my way into the Top 12,” he said. 

“I was actually feeling like I might have a chance to win because of the way they were coming to the boat. It actually probably turned out to be my biggest mistake because after that first flurry in the morning, they stayed small and I was only able to cull one time.” 

Most of Howells big fish came of either a Lunker Lures football head jig tipped with a 10-inch worm, or a Vertical Lures JigX swimming jig. “Both of my big fish the first day came on the football jig out on the ledge,” he said. “The second day the ledge bite died so I threw the football jig at docks and caught a couple of pretty good ones doing that.”

Howell estimates that over the course of the week he weighed five or six fish off of docks, and another two or three from shallow-running square bills fished near points. Looking back at where and how his fish were caught, he admits that Old Hickory was the perfect junk-fishing scenario. “We don’t really get a chance to do that much because you typically have to have such a big bag at every tournament,” he explained. 

“It was a great tournament, but if I could change anything it would be to go back to Saturday and try to get a little more weight,” Howell revealed about the week. “I’ve struggled through my career with trying to make memories happen every day rather than trying to do what needs to be done in order to better my position.” 

4th Place: Dean Rojas
It’s been quiet for Dean Rojas and his best friend Kermit over the last few tournaments where deepwater ledges were the predominant play. But at Old Hickory this week, there was only one option, and Rojas used his best weapon to work to his highest finish of 2008. “From the first day of practice I knew that the frog bite was going to be it for me,” he said. 

“When you go to a fishery like this, where ledges are supposed to dominate, I’m just tickled because I know that more than likely I’ll be the only one throwing a frog.”

Rojas, regardless of the ledge-bite possibility never intended to do anything but throw his Spro Bronze-Eye. “I went shallow from the start based on my history here,” he said, adding that after the last few events he was ready to be fishing his strength.

“I found the right banks that they were on and was able to just pick them apart,” Rojas said. “If I can get them to just show me where they’re at by nosing the bait during practice, I can go back during the tournament and where them out.”

Seeing what he wanted on Monday, Rojas spent the remainder of practice with his Quantum/Srpo combo in hand quickly touring shallow-water haunts, marking areas where he had a “nose up” on Kermit. “In the end,” he said, “It’s one of the few times where the frog held up for four days, which really made this a special tournament. 

“I got some good points out of the deal, so I can’t complain one bit. I wish they were all like this.”

Still, if forced to do so, Rojas laments that Thursday he sort of let the tournament get away from him. “I probably made 10,000 casts this week trying to cover water and not leave anything in the water,” he said. “About the only thing that I would change, if I could, would be to go back to the first day and sack everything that bit because I didn’t have a good idea of what it would take to win. 

“I tried too hard, I think, to manage my fish the first day.”

5th Place: Rick Clunn
With back-to-back Top 12 appearances – where coming into the final day he was a key player in the hunt – Rick Clunn would like to be able to finally say that he closed an Elite Series event with a win. To do so, the veteran pro admits that execution is the only way to win. “I only had five keeper bites all day, but only got four of them to the boat,” he said. 

“I lost fish all week long, but that’s just part of fishing a crankbait; however, I rarely ever lose a fish over three pounds on that bait, but I did today. You have to capitalize on every opportunity that you’re given if you intend to win, and this week I just lost way too many fish.”

Even prior to practice, Clunn knew what he would do upon arrival to Old Hickory based purely on his success from one lonely stretch of creek way up the Cumberland. “I love this particular creek because I’ve had three top 10 finishes out of it over the years,” Clunn said, and adding that he has never been able to finish a tournament there though. 

To combat the creek’s inability to rebound over four full tournament days, along with its susceptibility to additional competitors, Clunn sought back-up waters for the weekend. Unfortunately, he found that Kevin Wirth already occupied it. “My back-up creek, as it turned out, was the same creek that Kevin was in,” he said. “So I didn’t really have a back up (area) to go to.”

Knowing that he was down to only one spot Clunn was forced into playing defense, when, for the first time all week, another competitor came into the creek Saturday. As he pointed out though, the problem with playing defense is that you’re unable to advance the ball. “The problem with our sport is that when you go into a prevent defense, you’re fishing not to lose versus fishing to win,” he explained. 

That probably cost me yesterday because rather than just trying to keep putting fish in the boat, I tried to play defense when another competitor came in. 

“I wouldn’t say that it was that that cost me the win, but it certainly didn’t help things. What hurt me more than anything was just execution.”

Ultimately Clunn contends that on the final day the overnight rise in water, along with the day’s clouds, were likely more responsible for his light bag than pressure the area had received. “I was fishing the deeper ledges, the more sure ones, in this creek,” he said. “I kept thinking that the fish had moved up to the ends of these bluffs where it was a little shallower, but I just couldn’t ever get anything going.”

Clunn mixed in a jig occasionally over four days, which accounted for at least three of the fish he weighed during the week, but the shallow running RC 3.5 made by LuckyCraft for Bass Pro Shops was the key bait for him all week. “I had a really good week, and I’m grateful to finish the week where I did,” he said. 

“There are surely a few things I would like to go back and change, but I’ve been at this game long enough to know that you have to learn from each day and go from there.”

5th Place: Alton Jones
Ask Alton Jones if an angler should expect the year after a Classic win to be less than stellar, and his response would be a flat “no way” after the season he’s had as the defending champion of the sport’s Super Bowl. Coming into the event at Old Hickory Jones has had three Top 12 appearances to compliment the five other Top 50s he’s had this year. 

“I think anytime you win a tournament, it builds your confidence,” he said. “Winning the Classic proved to me that I had the ability to drop what I was doing and go find something that was working. That was the real key to my success this week because these fish are so finicky from one day to the next.”

With momentum on his side leaving Sunday’s launch, Jones was intent on at least scaring Wirth in the top spot. “I actually caught more fish today than I have been all week,” Jones said. “I had a flotilla of SKEETER owners with me and went back to where I’d been starting this week and caught three keepers off of that spot first thing this morning. Every time I would catch one, they’d give me some applause. It was just great!” 

At 10:30, Jones abandoned his areas that had been faithful to him all week to run 60 miles to a spot that he’d been saving in an attempt to make something happen. “The area that I started in was pretty much picked over by then,” he explained. “The move paid off because I managed to catch a four pounder on a YUM worm up there.” 

Alton explained that his most his weight came off of either a Booyah Pigskin Jig with a YUM Wooly Hog Tail as a trailer and a 10-inch YUM Ribbon-tail worm in either watermelon/red or plum. “Even when practice had ended, I thought it was going to be a deep tournament so the jig accounted for most of the fish I caught off the ledges the first day,” he said. “I pretty much committed to staying shallow with the worm, and the occasional crankbait, for the last two days.” 

In hindsight, the Classic champion explained that if he could change anything this week it would have been to go shallow sooner; however, he quickly pointed out that the deepwater bite is also very alluring. “I stopped on one of my deep holes on the way in this afternoon and caught fish on every cast for five minutes. There’d been another school move in, and looking back I wish I would have spent a little more time out there.”

7th Place: Brent Chapman
Final-Day Thoughts: “If there was ever a way to say that you ‘squeaked into one,’ I guess I’m living proof of that. I didn’t have anything to lose as a result, so I just went out trying to catch five fish. I think by noon I’d caught my last fish, and I decided to go to a dock that I’d fished everyday and never caught a fish off of. That’s where that five-pounder came from, which was the difference between a mediocre bag and a really good one that’ll move you up the leader board.”

Bait of Choice: Zoom Ole’ Monster Worm/Custom (T&C Cranks) Balsa crank bait

Biggest Challenge: “All of my fish were in five feet of water or less. Some of my fish were shallower than anything I’d ever caught. So you look back and realize that there might’ve been some water that you left. But then you find yourself trying to fish too much water, so I don’t know. It’s a tough call because you want to be as thorough as possible while being efficient at the same time.”

Key to the Week: “I really thought they would catch them deep, and I spent a lot of time out there trying to find them, but I’m a shallow-water specialist. Unfortunately I didn’t realize that the shallow-water bite was on like it was until after the first day. It makes me wish I would’ve been up there since it started, that’s for sure. I guess that’s just the nature of the beast.”

Week in Review: “I’m just dumb-founded to have made the Top 12 this week. This was a really important tournament for me in order to make the Classic, so I came into the week having decided to just do whatever I could in order to get as many points as possible.”

Key to the Week: “It was the bait. I never let the jig hit the bottom, but just swam it. They would just about take it out of your hand. In any of these grass lakes, it is really a good bait.”

Week in Review: “This was just a special week for me. It’s all about trying to get into the Classic right now, so I’m happy with the finish I had because it got me that much closer to being in Shreveport come February.”

9th Place: Michael Iaconelli
Final-Day Thoughts: “The one thing I keyed on today – and all week, really – was anything shallow. I went out today knowing that I would need a miracle to win, so it was really more about surviving and earning as many points as possible.”

Bait of Choice: Berkley Power Tube in black-blue-flake/Power Hawg in greenpumpkin/3/4-ounce Berkley Gripper Jig

Biggest Challenge: “I focused on the shallowest mud flats that had any type of cover. It didn’t matter if it was a stick or a lay down. Anything that was in the water – especially if it had some kind of horizontal angle to it - would hold a fish. There are a lot of targets in this lake, but finding productive water was the struggle.”

Key to the Week: “I saw a lot of guys out near the channel, but I stayed near the spawning flats. I don’t really know why (the fish) were still positioned there, but it has a lot to do with the water levels and the fact that they’re not pulling any water I suppose.”

Week in Review: “I had a really solid tournament this week. I was surprised at how shallow these fish were. I figured out pretty quick in practice that the ledges weren’t the deal. I’ll be honest – I wasn’t looking forward to this tournament at all because I’d had two really bad tournaments here in the past. With the week I’ve had and learning what I did, I really like it now.”

Key to the Week: “I lucked into finding some shallow fish, otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here right now.”

Week in Review: “Coming into the week, my goal today was to accumulate as many points as I could. As a result, the first day of the tournament I was a wreck out there, but I was finally able to settle down and fish. I made another cut and got some more points, so it’s off to Erie now.” 

12th Place: Marty Stone
Final-Day Thoughts: “I survived the final day by really just cutting everything I had tied on off and starting over with eight rods. I went up shallow and just went fishing. It was great to be able to do that because we’ve really had to be out deep so much this year. Like I said, hindsight is a killer this week, but I’m really happy to finish where I did and survive the week.”

Bait of Choice: Variety of jigs, worms, and other assorted baits

Biggest Challenge: “I’m a shallow-water fisherman, but it’s really where I struggled some this week. The first day I caught all of my fish the first day in 12- to 14-feet of water. Hindsight hurts me because this tournament was one shallow, but that first day was magical.”

Key to the Week: “Just being versatile and fishing whatever was in front of me. I can say that now, but midway through the second day when the ledge bite petered out, I was singing a different tune.”

Week in Review: “It’s been a while, but I’m finally fishing good enough to win one. This tournament was really important to me in solidifying that fact in my mind. It was also a really good tournament to move me back into the hunt for a Classic berth.”

FINAL STANDINGS

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