Entry 310-5

Shaw Grigsby – Raging for Summertime Bass on the Mississippi River

Part 5: If I Could’ve Made One More Cast

Question: Tell us about the final day, Shaw.

Grigsby: I went to my big-fish place first on the final morning. I fished all around the duck blind and caught four or five bass, and there wasn’t a single keeper in the bunch. I was really disappointed. I was hoping to get one or two good kicker fish at the duck blind, before I went to my numbers region. But the water had dropped tremendously – about 6 inches. When the water goes down 6 inches in an area that doesn’t have 6 inches to give, you’ve got some very-skinny water in which a bass can hardly swim. I didn’t know if I was going to be able to get out of my big-fish area and reach my numbers place.

However, I was able to rock the boat and float out. And, I stopped off at a new region on the way to the spot where I’d caught the most. But I didn’t catch anything there. When I reached my numbers area, I started immediately catching bass. And my seventh fish that I caught in this area was a keeper. Then I caught another seven fish, before I caught a second keeper. Then I caught about eight more fish and had a keeper. I only had three keeper bass, and then I didn’t have another keeper bite.

I headed back out to the take-out point and had 5-minutes left before I had to check-in with the officials. I thought I could pitch two more times to a tree, coming out of the area I was fishing, before I’d have to crank the big engine and make a run for the check-in point. But I got hung-up on a big log going toward the tree. The boat was wedged, and I couldn’t get off the tree. I pulled the trolling motor up, put my lifejacket on, put my big motor down and tried to pull the boat off the stump with the big motor. However, in so doing I got hung-up in some more logs. Finally I got the boat spun around, got the boat off the logs and headed back to the check-in point. So, I finished in sixth place. I really believe if I could’ve fished that tree, I might have caught another bass that would’ve moved me up in the standings, but you never know.

Question: So how much did you earn for a sixth place finish?

Grigsby: $13,500. But as important as the money was, that sixth-place finish moved me up to 15th place in the Angler-of-the-Year race, which will put me in pretty good shape to make the Bassmaster Classic in 2010.

Question: Shaw, why did you get so hot on the Rage Craw and fish it so heavily in this tournament?

Grigsby: The Rage Craw is an incredible bait. I think the Rage Craw is one of the best soft-plastic baits Strike King has ever produced. I use the Rage Craw on the backs of my jigs, I use it Texas-rigged, and I flip with it. The claws have so much action that the bait looks alive, regardless of how you rig it or how you fish it. At this tournament, I was fishing in several areas where other people were fishing, and I was catching bass, and they weren’t. I really believed the Rage Craw was the reason that I was catching bass, and they weren’t. I might have been the only contestant in the race using the Rage Craw.

Question: Where’s your next tournament?

Grigsby: I’ll be fishing a Bassmaster Elite Series Tournament on Lake Oneida in New York during the second week in August.

Contents:

• Part 1: Why I Used Aerial Reconnaissance before the Tournament
• Part 2: Flipping Skinny Water
• Part 3: The First Day of Competition
• Part 4: The Second and Third Days of Competition
• Part 5: If I Could've Made One More Cast