|
TULSA,
OK - Tennis shoe sized swimbaits remained the fashionable bait of choice for winner Byron Velvick and a huge portion of the tournament competitors at Clear Lake, California. But Tommy Biffle gave the huge rubber baitfish imitators little attention and resorted to the roots of his successful 25 years as a legendary pro for a 6th place finish at the Bassmaster Elite Golden State Shootout.
Biffle
anchored his 4-day weight of 81 pounds
with a Texas-rigged black neon Gene
Larew Biffle Bug that he
flipped and pitched to tulles in
shallow, warmer, dingier water with
his signature blue-colored 7’ 6”
Tour Elite Quantum rod. The
reel he used is a Quantum prototype
that performed flawlessly, but will be
kept secretive until its unveiling at
the fishing industry’s ICAST trade
show this summer.
Biffle
says he designed the big stick (model
TTBC767F) to be beefy but balanced.
“It’s the rod I use every time
I’m flipping and pitching heavy
cover. It’s a stout blank because
you gotta be able to move big fish out
of heavy cover, but it’s not tip
heavy, it’s balanced,” explained
the 52 year-old who owns an ATV
dealership in his hometown of Wagoner,
Oklahoma, in addition to being one of
bass fishing’s top touring pros.
“The first day was tough. I had 16
bites, all flippin, and lost 10 of
them. On Day 2, I went right back to
flippin the same water, I made no
adjustments, and I caught every fish
that bit,” said Biffle.
“Byron won, but he knows swimbaits better than anybody. It’s hard to just walk into a tackle store here at Clear Lake, buy a few swimbaits, and be competitive against a guy like Byron -- not unless they are just gobbling them up like they were when we were here in 2007 -- but that wasn’t the case this week. So I stuck with what I know best,” explained Biffle.
|
