Entry 104-2
Road To The Classic - Mark Davis
Carrying Momentum from Table Rock to Lake Eufaula
Editor's Note: On May 22, 2004, in Columbus, Mississippi, on the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, Mark Davis of Mt. Ida, Arkansas, once again proved why he deserves to go to the 2004 BASS Masters Classic. From the first day of the tournament until the last day, Davis lead the field of Elite 50 and won the tournament. "I started looking for these bass using a Strike King Series 1 crankbait. But on the last day, I had to change to the Strike King 3X ribbontail worm to win the tournament."
This week we're looking at the five defining times throughout Mark Davis' 2004 year of professional bass fishing that have secured him a place in this year's BASS Masters Classic.
Davis: After winning at Table Rock, I carried a lot of confidence with me to Lake Eufaula, Alabama, which was the next tournament. I was really feeling good about my ability to find bass and to catch bass on the spinner bait. When we arrived at Lake Eufaula, I chose the 3/4-ounce Strike King spinner bait to look for bass. This time, instead of the Colorado blades that I'd used at Table Rock, I selected two gold willow -leaf blades for the chartreuse-and-white spinner bait.
I found bass on some deep stumps and drop-off ledges in Lake Eufaula. I was slow rolling my spinner bait in about 10 feet of water to get the bass to bite. Although I finished in eighth place I could have easily won that tournament, if we hadn't had a weather change on the third day of the tournament. This pattern worked really well for two days. I really believe if the spinner-bait pattern had held up for the third day, I'd have had a really good chance to win. The key to slow-rolling the spinner bait is not the speed of the retrieve, but your ability to bump cover with that spinner bait as you slow-roll it. When you slow-roll a spinner bait, remember that you have to get that spinner bait in contact with cover when you're fishing deep just as you have to make the spinner bait hit cover when you're fishing shallow.
If you're fishing shallow and casting your spinner bait to a naked bank, you're probably not going to catch nearly as many bass as you can catch if you cast that spinner bait to a bank with grass, wood cover, stumps, logs or rocks on it. You have to keep that same mindset when you are slow-rolling spinner baits. You need to be fishing the same kind of cover that's under the water and deep when you are slow-rolling as you'll fish if you're using the spinner bait to fish down the bank.
In this particular tournament in Lake Eufaula, when my spinner bait hit the cover, the bass were so aggressive, they would attack immediately. I didn't have to kill the bait or break the action of the retrieve when the lure hit the cover, to get the bass to bite.
So, if there's a tip on how to slow-roll the spinner bait more effectively, I suggest you try to find deep-water cover and slow-roll the spinner bait through, just as you will if you're going to fish the spinner bait through cover on the bank. Get that mental picture of how that spinner bait will work through the bank cover. Then keep that same mental picture as you work your bait through that deep-water cover. Slow-rolling the spinner bait is a very-effective technique to catch good bass when the bass are deep. And, I really believe that finding the bass deep and trusting my Strike King Spinner Bait, to make those bass bite at Eufaula is another key ingredient to helping me to win a place at this year's Classic.
Contents:
- Part 1: Don't Come In Out of the Rain
- Part 2: Carrying Momentum from Table Rock to Lake Eufaula
- Part 3: Table Rock Days 2, 3 and 4
- Part 4: Diamonds at Guntersville
- Part 5: Worming a Check Out of the Tournament
