Guntersville, AL - This week, the 99 anglers on the Bassmaster Elite Series entering the second half of the 2009 season find themselves on historic Lake Guntersville in Northern Alabama. While the event is billed “The Southern Challenge,” catching a limit this week should be anything but challenging.
At 69,000 acres, Guntersville offers a plethora of options when it comes to putting five hawgs in the
livewell. When the Elites last visited the lake during the 2007 campaign, the initials reigned supreme as KVD amassed over 65 pounds to claim the title. In 2006, Mike Iaconelli stood atop the podium at Guntersville with a four day total of 71 pounds.
(Photos by Mark Jeffreys and Matt Pangrac)
Much like the pre-fight hype surrounding the recent Pacquiao-Hatton boxing tilt, Guntersville is shaping up to be a slugfest. However, this event will live up to the billing. Many of the anglers The BZ talked to Wednesday morning at the launch ramp used words like incredible, awesome, unbelievable, and easy to describe the fishing during the first two days of practice.
Guntersville will offer one of the first opportunities of the season for all anglers to fish their strengths, whatever that many be. With the high water, warm weather, and time of year, there are prespawn, spawning, and postspawn bass throughout the lake anywhere from inches deep to 20 feet deep.
While the weather at the last Elite Series tournament on Smith Mountain gave the anglers their first break from raingear in 2009, it appears as though it’s back to the norm this week at Guntersville as a chance of thunderstorms lingers through Saturday.
Heavy rainfall throughout the area will also play a big factor this week in Alabama, as heavy storms have been blanketing the area much the day Wednesday and are expected to continue well into the evening and throughout the night.
Here are what some of the pros had to say about their practice on Guntersville:
Dean Rojas
“The fishing has been really good and it’s going to come down to a matter of who can find the four pounders. I think that you will need 18 to 20 pounds a day to put you in the Top 12 cut and a six to eight pounder to catapult you toward the top. Right now I like what I’m doing and the fish that I’m catching are good quality so it’s shaping up to be a good week.
“The main river channel is dirty and some of the pockets are stained. There’s no clear water that I can find so the visibility is anywhere from six inches to two and a half feet in some areas. Plus, it’s been cloudy and windy with all the thunderstorms rolling in so we’ll just take what it gives us.
“The lake is going to fish really big this week. The fish are everywhere from a foot of water down to 20 feet. You’re going to see a lot of different techniques used this week. If the water was down, I’d say that the deep water ledge fishing would be the deal but with the water up, it could change some things.”
Brian Clark
“You can catch them offshore, you can catch them spawning, there’s a perch and brim spawn going on and also a shad spawn going on so you can go catch them shallow. You can fish wood and catch them. You can pull off and fish humps, rock piles, and shell beds and catch them. You can pretty much catch them any way you want to.
“I think everyone will catch them really, really well. With all the rain we have been getting, it’s stirred the lake up quite a bit and made it dirtier. I like flipping more than I like sitting offshore dragging stuff so hopefully with the weather I’ll be able to stay shallow.
“I really have a mixed bag of stuff going. I’d be surprised if it would be over 15 pounds a day to get a check. They’re going to catch them good, though.”
Mark Tucker
“I’m not sure what all this rain is going to do, but it’s going to be awesome. I’m not seeing a lot of the five and six pounders but you can catch so many four pounders it is unreal.
“A lot of guys are saying it may take up to 25 pounds a day to win but the problem that you run into here is that we are in bass capital of the world and the locals are out in force. If you start catching them, you’re going to have company.
“That’s the only thing that scares me. There’s a pattern working so you can pretty much go down the lake and work a pattern but the problem is that if the locals see you catch one, they will go right over to the spot and homestead it. I’ve seen it so much during the last two days.
“Other than that, 20 pounds a day and you should make a top five. The fish are really pressured so I think that’s going to play a lot into it. I think that I can catch 18 to 20 pounds a day but if you make one wrong move you end up with 16 pounds. You need some of those big bites and I haven’t caught one of those yet. But, I haven’t stayed on a spot long enough yet to get a big bite.
“It’s going to be a good tournament and I hope the weather straightens out but on the other hand I hope it stays nasty and keeps some people off the water, so it’s a catch 22.”
Steve Kennedy
“This place is incredible and the number of fish is unbelievable. The first day of practice I probably caught 70 fish. Most of them were off three or four places and I’d sit there and catch 15 shorts and then catch a four pounder and quit. I got on one school yesterday and I think I caught a fish on every cast for an hour but only had one keeper out of the bunch.
“At this point, I probably have a dozen places where you can catch them like that but I only have one place where I can catch three and four pounders. Honestly, I’ve caught one fish over five pounds but I’ve heard of some guys catching giants. I’m afraid that I’m missing something but when I get on them, they’re there.
“You can go out there and go sight fishing, spinnerbait, crankbait, big worm, Flash – there are so many fish you can do whatever you want to do. It’s just a matter of catching those bigger fish.
“There are lots of locals out there fishing but there’s enough fish go around. I’ve got two or three places that I’m really counting on and if someone is sitting them it’ll get in my head for sure. But there are so many places here where you can go out and catch good fish that I think it’ll fish pretty big this week.”
On the Comeback: Peter Thliveros
“I’ve not had any trouble catching fish anywhere on the lake. It’s the quality of the fish that will be the key. I think that it is probably going to take somewhere between 15 and 17 pounds a day to get a check. A 3 pound average shouldn’t be an issue depending on the weather.
“There are a lot of fish still spawning, there are a lot of fish done spawning, and there are some that have yet to spawn and I’ve caught them in all three stages. It’s as good as the lake is going to get for this type of tournament because it will spread everyone out.
“I’ve caught them from 2 to 15 feet deep on a variety of baits. The lake is as hot as it can get. I expect a lot of good weight come in every day of the tournament. It probably will take 21 or 22 pounds a day to win. Someone will have a 30 pounds stringer one day and back it up with stringers in the 20s.
“I hope this is where I can turn it around this year. I don’t have any really good explanation as to what happened the first half of the year other than I haven’t been around the right quality of fish and have had a run of horrible luck. Hopefully I’ll be able to turn it around.”
Zell Rowland
“Practice here is always good for a lot of the guys. It’s been OK but I’m not overly enthused about being able to catch a lot of stringers over 25 pounds. To go out there and catch anywhere from 16 to 18 seems to be really easy. We have a lot of different stuff moving in this week with the water continuing to rise.
“It’s going to be interesting. It’s been a topwater week for me and right now that’s how I plan on fishing the tournament. I know the lake and I know the areas that have the capability of producing big stringers. If I can catch 15 to 17 pounds pretty quick then I’ll probably get out there and start experimenting.”
