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Norman,
OK – After the first seven events of the 2008 BASS Elite Series, Dave Wolak was sitting pretty in 17th place in the Angler of the Year standings. But Kentucky Lake and Old Hickory were not kind to him. He finished 92nd and 78th, respectively, at the
eighth and ninth tournaments and dropped down to 35th in the AOY race, right on the bubble for Classic qualification.
He’s a three time Classic qualifier and a native northeasterner -- smart money says that when the scales are closed at Oneida in a few weeks, he’ll have punched a ticket to the 2009 event on the Red River. While he wouldn’t guarantee success in New York, he’s pretty happy with the locations of the last two tournaments.
“If you had told me at the beginning of the season that I’d be 35th with two tournaments left to go and the last two would be in New York, I would’ve felt pretty good about it,” he said.
His Elite Series numbers bear out his confidence. He finished 4th and 5th on Oneida in 2006 and 2007, respectively (the former was a regular Elite Series tournament, the latter was a Major). Last year he was 21st at Erie. In two other New York Elite Series tournaments in New York, both at Champlain, he’s ended up 23rd and 17th. In the Opens, he had a 12th at Erie in 2003.
His success on New York waters comes from years of experience which have taught him that “fishing up there requires certain general decisions versus specific decisions. You have to know when to suck it up and take 15 pounds instead of gambling for 20 pounds.”
He attributed last year’s money finish at Erie to the fact that he “knew when to bail.” He added that the smallmouths roam so much that “you have to fish each day like a brand new day. Some guys who are used to fishing a high spot with two stumps on it all day at Kentucky Lake may not be able to make those adjustments. With smallmouths sometimes it doesn’t happen.”
At lakes like Oneida and Champlain, he said it’s foolish to focus on one species of bass to the exclusion of the other. “You have to be able to bail on the largemouths if that bite is not as positive as it should be, and you have to bail on the smallmouths and go to the largemouths on particular days. I’ve done it at Champlain lots of times.”
Does he foresee the possibility of a largemouth-only creel winning at Oneida?
“I guess there’s a way to do it. Tommy Biffle proved it. But if you do that you’re fishing for at most ten bites a day. If you get them, they’re going to weigh. But more guys are doing it there now and I don’t think it’ll be like in the past. Smallmouths will be a bigger factor. Statistically, you can win on largemouths, but seven of the top ten will be on smallmouths.”
He may start on smallies and then switch if the opportunity presents itself. “There’s a certain comfort in doing that. If you get five fish in your first five casts, that take’s the pressure off a little bit, as opposed to if you go for largemouths all day and you’re still trying to fill out your limit at the end of the day. The pressure in the afternoon could drive you crazy. So I may do a little bit of both.”
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