Posted -  August 14th, 2008 11:00pm CST

Mark Rose Brings In Over 20 Pounds, Vida Keeps Pace With Over 17 Pounds 

Story by Brent Conway - Photos by  Matt Pangrac and Dan O'Sullivan

Columbia, SC – Lake Murray is as storied a fishery as can be found, at least in terms of tournament fishing; however, over the last decade much has changed – most notably the absence of the abundant mats of elodea and other aquatic vegetation that once lined the 650 miles of shoreline of the palmetto impoundment, as well as the introduction of blueback herring.

Like many lakes in the southeast, Murray has seen the non-native herring come in abundance. Herring, for better or worse, have the ability to single-handedly dictate a tournament’s outcome given that bass often enthusiastically focus their movements on them.

While black bass at Murray often tend to take on the wolf-pack tendencies of their striper cousins, many pros revealed Wednesday that finding quality groups of keepers was, at best, a hit or miss affair – find them and you’re golden. Miss, and you’re going home early.

Pre-tournament reports pointed out that there wasn’t a clear delineation between the shallow-water guys versus the deepwater structure fisherman as both varieties were struggling prior to Wednesday’s mandatory day off. However, the August weather turned more October-like as a strong front pushed through dumping nearly two inches of rain on the lake leaving lingering overcast skies and lowered air and water temperatures.

This forced a wrinkle into many anglers’ plans the two inches of rainwater created some serious runoff, which, in turn, created some stain in the shallows – making the skinny bite look like the deal come Friday as many of the lake’s creeks and rivers will carry silt in beyond the opening day.

Summertime fishing at Murray – at least as far as big-time tournaments like this week’s $2-million Forrest Wood Cup – is largely about all about timing and location…and a lot of hard work. Ultimately, the angler who wins the $1-milliion first place prize Sunday will have made the most out of being in the right place at the right time.

Estimated weights for Friday’s cut ranged from 10 to 12 pounds a day; however, Marion, AR pro Mark Rose apparently didn’t get the memo. Rose crossed the stage on the first day toting a five-bass stringer weighing 20 pounds, 2 ounces – the type of quality that everyone knew was here, but few had been able to find.

In second place was Kevin Vida, from Clare, MI, who totaled 17 pounds, 5 ounces by day’s end. TBF qualifier Brian Travis, from Conover, NC, brought 13 pounds and 15 ounces to the scales in the biggest tournament of his life to take the third-place spot.

Ending the opening quarter in third place was Bud Pruitt, from Houston, TX, who brought a 13- pound 13-ounce tournament limit to the scales Thursday. The veteran pro from Bismark, AR, Ron Shuffield, ended his first day with a solid 13-pound, 9-ounce five-fish limit of bass to round out the top five. 

Rose Trusted his Instincts For the Lead
Mark Rose, in his first tournament day, basically tripled his best practice day and put himself on course for a million-dollar payday. He did it by going with his gut. “I just had a terrible practice, but in a big tournament like this you have to trust your instincts,” he explained.

“With all of the rain that was coming in I figured that some of the bigger fish would run up and get on the bank with the muddy water. I figured I would go up on the bank for a few hours and get one big bite and then go do a little milk run and catch some of the little pound-and-a-half fish that I’d been catching.”

While he may have planned initially to hit his milk run to finish out an 11-pound limit, just before lunch he realized that he had enough to make a serious statement to get the week started. “Three hours into the day I had my three biggest fish,” he said. “I decided to stay right there and see what else might happen.”

Rose revealed that he’s staying inside one general area, but cautions that his entire day came down to three big bites – something that he can’t predict or guarantee Friday. “I’m not running all over the lake,” he said. “You really have no idea how hard it is to do that out there right now, so I’m really just going to have to keep my nose to the grindstone to get five keepers again.”

Rose's second fish of the day kept him focused on the area, as with it he was sure that he’d found something special. Luckily, his third bite - the biggest of the day – came shortly afterwards and cemented his early inclinations. “I found this area the last hour of practice, and it just looked good. I fished it, but I never caught a single fish,” he said. 

“I just felt sure that it had the potential…it definitely has the ingredients to for big fish,” Rose added. “Hopefully I’ll learn a little more about it tomorrow. If I can get seven or eight pounds tomorrow out of there I’ll leave it alone for the weekend.”

Vida Million-Dollar Water
With seven keepers on the day, Kevin Vida is convinced that he’s on the winning fish, and if he can get them to bite he’ll be a millionaire. “I basically quit fishing around 1:30, so I would definitely say that the day went better than I had expected it to,” Vida exclaimed. “I thought that I could do this…I knew that my area had this type of potential.”

Before quitting in the early afternoon, Vida explained that he ran through a handful of spots he’d found during practice. After catching two fish upriver that wouldn’t upgrade his back, he opted to go looking instead of pounding on biting fish. “This morning, they were biting pretty consistently – like every 20 minutes,” he explained, while commenting on the timing of his bigger fish.

“I went looking for some ‘shallow-ish’ water after 1:30,” Vida added. “I actually found some more water that looked about the same (as his primary area), but the area that I’m in has a lot of fish…I just have to catch them.”

Vida explained that the bass are following bluebacks into the shallows, along with the abundance of sunfish there too. This creates a springtime feel to his summertime hole. “There are a lot of cruisers up shallow, so I have to catch them fast,” he said. “If they see you, you’re done. It’s a lot like spring fishing, only I’m doing it in August.”

Kevin saw plenty of big fish in his primary area – enough at least to convince him that he won’t be going back Friday hoping, instead, to save his best water for the weekend. “I’m probably not even going to go in there tomorrow unless I absolutely have to,” he said.

“I feel like I can catch 9 pounds up the river. I went up there for 20 minutes and have two fish, so that’s what I’m doing. I just can’t take the chance of ruining the fish in my primary area. They are literally million-dollar fish.”

Travis Mixed it Up
TBF representative Brian Travis is making the most of his opportunity to be in the biggest tournament of his career. To do so, he admits that he had to throw everything he learned from practice out the window and start over Thursday. “The pattern that I’ve been running for the past four days just totally changed today,” he said. “I went and done something that I haven’t done all week, which is to just go fishing.”

Travis explained that he’s simply fishing in the moment – if it looks good, he fishes it. If it looks really good, he’ll go back and fish it again. “I went back to a couple of my better spots later in the day, but it didn’t work out,” he said. “I’m just covering a lot of water and trying to keep it wet.”

Over the course of the day, Brian had five bites and he was able to capitalize on each of them, but knows that Friday is a new day. “I could very easily zero tomorrow,” he said. “I live about two hours from here, so Murray is very familiar to me. The thing is that I’ve never fished it in the summer. I’m just living a dream, and hopefully I can do it again tomorrow.”

Pruitt Made Three Decisions Thursday
Wednesday’s weather system erased the plans of many in the field – some for the worst, and others, like Bud Pruitt, for the best. “I had to regroup today completely,” he said. “After the rain and change in weather, I felt pretty sure that what I’d found in practice wasn’t going to hold up. I decided to just do what I like to do, and keep it pretty simple.”

Pruitt had three areas set aside for Thursday that he worked methodically throughout the day, spending around three hours in each spot. “I only my three moves today, which I think is really key,” he said. “I’m seeing a lot of guys buzzing around, but I told myself that I was only going to make three moves today. I stuck with it and it worked out.”

Pruitt feels like he has a “one-two” punch and is around winning fish; however, like everyone else he knows that he’s going to have to have a consistent day in order to make the weekend. “I feel like I’m around enough fish to really do well,” he said. “I have two other places that I know are holding fish that I never even touched today. I just didn’t have enough time, and again, I told myself that I was only going to make three decisions today.”

“Tomorrow, we’ll just have to see. I’m going to basically roll with the same strategy that I had today, although I did notice something today,” Pruitt added. “These fish really bite when a boat blows through the area. It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever seen. If I start struggling tomorrow, I might fire up the Yamaha and start doing 360s.”

Kreiger Stays on Top
Like many in the Top 10 on the first day, Kreiger echoes the difficulty Murray presented as a result of the change in weather. To overcome it, he said that he just dropped his trolling motor and went fishing. “I’m throwing topwater, and I fished it all day long,” he said.

“At one point in the day I’d had 11 blow-ups and had only caught two fish. It was tough and frustrating. Thank God I caught five.”

To further complicate the blow-up issues, Koby explained that he had trouble staying hooked up with the bass that would commit. “The fist fish I hooked this morning was around five pounds, and I jumped him off,” he said. “Then I jumped off one about four and another three. It was just a struggle.”

Over the course of the day, Kreiger caught seven fish to compliment the three disconnects and 11 near misses – two of which came in the final minutes of the day. For that reason alone he’s looking forward to an earlier boat position. “There’s a span of time, even during practice, that seems like it’s between 12:00 and 2:00 that the just quit biting,” he explained.

“I caught three keepers during the last 40 minutes that I had to fish, so the extra 30 minutes that I’ll have tomorrow should help.”

Koby is hoping for the best on Friday, given his by-the-seat-of-his-pants approach to day one. “I don’t really have a specific area that I’m fishing, so I can’t really say that I’m saving anything for the weekend.” he explained.

“I’m just going down the bank fishing. If I come to a little cove of something that has what I’m looking for I’ll pull in and spend a while. That’s what I’m going to do again tomorrow.”

Nixon Has the Patience to Make it Work
Larry Nixon is as salty a tournament competitor as you’ll find, so when he says that he’s in good water it’s a pretty safe bet that he’s right. However, as the veteran pro explained the quality of the water is only as good as the fishes’ willingness to cooperate. “I’ve got a good spot,” he said.

“There’s a lot of fish around me, it’s just a matter of whether or not they want to eat. I can be sitting right in the middle of them, and if they aren’t eating, there isn’t anything I can do to change it.”

Nixon explained that he persistently threw everything from a shaky-head worm to a Carolina rig over the course of the day to get the six keepers he boated. “I’m just having to just hang around and haunt it, and haunt it, and haunt it,” he said.

“As you can see, I’ve really got a good pattern going. In practice though, I just never could get anything going. I knew that I had a pretty good spot, so I just decided that I was going to do whatever it took to get bit.”

Nixon admitted that during the five hours he spent milking his area, he likely could’ve added another three-plus pounds to his ending weight. “I jumped one good one off and then I had two four pounders that hit the bait at the same time,” he said. “I missed both of them…it was something else.”

Larry said that Friday’s game plan will be identical to Thursday’s – persistence, persistence, persistence. “I’m really excited about the start that I had to the tournament,” he said. “This is the best string that I’ve caught since I’ve been here. I went to my water this morning with the idea that I was going to camp out, which is exactly what I plan to do tomorrow.”

“I do have one little stretch of water that I haven’t been to since practice,” he added. “It’s a pretty long stretch and I’m hoping that I can save it. Who knows though…I’m just going to go fishing and see what happens.”

Svebek Confident After Big Bite
Carl Svebek told The BASS ZONE prior to the tournament that he’d had a mediocre practice, but felt pretty sure he could catch a limit. He did just that, and then some. “I really didn’t know what to expect,” he said. “I really felt like on a good day I could go out and catch 9 or 10 pounds. I was just fortunate to get a really good bite today, which put me into contention to make the cut tomorrow.”

Learning something new with each fish that’s caught is a key to successful fishing. Svebek couldn’t agree more, as he explained that after catching his big fish of the day around 1:30, he was able to further expand on his pattern. “I really learned a lot today and fished differently than I did in practice,” he said.

“I spent a lot of time out on the main lake during practice, but after I caught my big fish today I started moving back into some creeks. That’s something that I’ll be doing a lot more of tomorrow for sure.”

With newfound confidence as a result of a strong start, Carl is looking forward to Friday’s second quarter. “I wasn’t really on a super pattern coming in, but after the day I had I’m really looking forward to tomorrow,” he said. “I left a lot for the imagination today, and plan on hitting them tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to it.”

Montgomery Goes Big Upriver
Andy Montgomery came into the week as one of the few who’d had a solid practice. He was able to back that up with a solid start with a bright chance of seeing the stage on Sunday. “I had a real good start,” he said. “I pretty much picked one off here and there. I was just really fortunate to have a few good bites.”

Andy caught six fish today – every bite he had – which was off the numbers he’d been seeing in practice. “I expected to catch 10 to 12 fish, but I didn’t know what they would weight,” he said. “It looked to me like that the water had come up a little bit, and I think that might have had something to do with it.”

Fishing upriver, Montgomery plans to do the opposite on the second day. “Tomorrow I’m going to fish down lake a little bit,” he said. “I don’t really think I can catch them two days in a row off the same stuff, so I’m going to go to some of my shallow stuff down lake and see what happens.”

With a Top 10 start to the week, Montgomery is confident that he’ll be able to catch a limit Friday…and hopes it will be enough to fish the weekend. “I’m confident that I can catch a limit tomorrow, but I’m not real sure what they’ll weigh,” he said.

“With the water they’ll be pulling through tomorrow and Saturday, the bite should get a lot stronger. I just want to be in the hunt, and I feel pretty good about my chances right now.”

Bennett ‘Just Fished’ All Day
Michael Bennett, like many of the others in the Top 10, is counting his blessings that he’s in the mix heading into the second morning of the tournament. Of the 25 spots he’d found during practice, he fished 22 Thursday. “I went through about every spot I had today, and some of them multiple times,” he said.

“I had 10 rods on my deck this morning, and I think that I used seven of them.”

Bennett wasn’t at all bashful in saying that he was just scratching around trying to find anything that would bite. “I’m really just going down the bank fishing,” he said. “There wasn’t anything special. 

“The problem was that the fish just completely readjusted today,” Bennett added. “I figured out kind of what they did once the sun came out, so hopefully if it shines tomorrow I can get another limit.”

For Friday, Michael plans to further complicate his casting deck’s layout by added more choices. “I actually think tomorrow I’ll rig up a few more rods and just start over,” he jokingly said. “The few fish I found (Thursday) were just really scattered. It will be interesting tomorrow for sure.”

DAY ONE STANDINGS