Entry 321-2

Greg Hackney Tries Out the Strike King Hack Attack at Lake Oneida

Part 2: The First Day of Competition

Question: So what decision did you make on the first day of competition?

Hackney: I decided to fish for smallmouths first, because I knew I could get a limit of smallmouths quickly. Then I thought I’d go try to fish for largemouths in hopes of being able to cull my stringer up.

Question: So how did you do on that first day?

Hackney: I caught a limit that weighed 13 pounds, 7 ounces. I had four smallmouths and one largemouth, but I lost the biggest smallmouth that I’d ever seen at Lake Oneida on the first day of the tournament. That smallmouth would have weighed 5 or 6 pounds.

Question: Greg, what was the pattern?

Hackney: Oneida’s a flat, shallow lake, and I was looking for underwater mounds in the grass. The grass in Oneida grows from the bank to about 14-feet deep and most of the fish I was catching were in 6- to 9-foot-deep water. I would fish around in the grass until I located a high spot that would top out at about 5 or 6 feet from the surface. I learned that the bass would be holding around the tops of those mounds in the grass.

Many of these mounds would be right out in the middle of the grass and completely invisible – except to a depth finder.But I never could put together a pattern for fishing the edges. The mounds seemed to be the spots where most of the bass were holding. Most of the grass I was fishing was about 2-feet under the surface. So, I just used my trolling motor to move around above the grass, until I found the mounds. Then I’d back off and start flipping to those mounds.

Question: How were the bass taking the Hack Attack jig?

Hackney: When I was fishing for smallmouth, I’d use the one ounce jig, but when I was fishing for largemouths I would fish the 3/4-ounce Hack Attack because the largemouths seemed to like a slower fall. When I’d fish for largemouths, I’d really have to fish for them. By that I mean I’d let the jig fall all the way to the bottom, lift it up, shake the jig, then pull it up again and shake it again. I had to convince them to bite the jig, but with a smallmouth, they would usually take the jig when it was falling, take it the instant it would hit the bottom or take the jig just as I’d start to move it to puck it up the bottom.

Question: What color Hack Attack jigs were you using?

Hackney: In the early mornings while the sky was somewhat dark or the sky was cloudy, I was fishing the Summer Craw Hack attack with a chartreuse Rage Craw behind it. The bass seemed to like that slightly-darker-colored jig with a chartreuse trailer better in the morning than they did the yellow perch. But then as the day brightened, they’d prefer the yellow-perch color, and I’d generally fish it the rest of the day.

Question: So on the first day of competition, you had 13 pounds and 7 ounces for five fish. Where did that put you?

Hackney: I was between 30th and 35th place. I don’t remember the exact spot, but I was about in the middle of the pack. I think I was in 33rd. In a tournament like this, you don’t really worry about what place you’re in but instead you look at the weight you have as compared to the weight that the person leading the tournament has. And so at the end of the first day, I was only 1-1/2-pounds out of the top 12.

Because the tournament lasted for 4 days, I compared my weight of fish to the weights that the competitors ahead of me had to determine how many pounds of bass I needed to catch the next day to move-up in the competition. And with 4 days to compete, there’s plenty of time to move-up if you were in the top third of the pack. My goal in this tournament was to catch at least two limits of bass to make the Bassmaster Classic. My main objective was to make the top 12.

Question: What did you think you were going to have to do on the second day to move-up your standings and up your weight?

Hackney: I thought I was going to have to catch more largemouths and fewer smallmouths.

Next: The Second Day of Competition

Contents:

• Part 1: The Key to the Tournament - The Hack Attack and the Rodent
• Part 2: The First Day of Competition
• Part 3: The Second Day of Competition
• Part 4: The Third Day of Competition
• Part 5: The Final Day of Competition