Entry 329-1

Strike King’s James Niggemeyer and the Lures That Got Him to the 2010 Bassmaster Classic

Part 5: The Importance of the Game Hawg in 2009

Question: James, what’s the fifth lure that you feel played a critical role in your winning a berth in the 2010 Bassmaster Classic?

Niggemeyer: We had a tournament this year on the Mississippi River at Fort Madison, Iowa, with some really-difficult fishing conditions for catching bass. We were faced with rising, muddy water, and many of the more-productive areas that I’d found in practice were almost too muddy to fish. When you’ve got a really-tough tournament to fish, oftentimes simply surviving and not having a terrible tournament can keep you in the hunt for a berth in the Bassmaster Classic. During the tournament on the Mississippi River, I was trying to survive and not fall too far back from the leaders in the race for the Angler-of-the-Year title. I was able to catch several key fish in that event on the Strike King Game Hawg that I wouldn’t have caught without the Game Hawg.

Question: Why did you choose the Game Hawg to fish when the water was rising and muddy?

Niggemeyer: The Game Hawg has a lot of action with all of its appendages. It has four swimming appendages and two other appendages that sort of hang off the side of it. So, it displaces a lot of water and is a great bait to fish in rising or moving water when you need a bait to fish that’s got a lot of movement to it to attract the bass.

Question: How were you fishing the Game Hawg?

Niggemeyer: I was Texas-rigging it with either a 3/16- or a 1/4-ounce bullet sinker up the line on 20-pound-test fluorocarbon line. I was pitching it around newly-flooded brush, laydown logs and any other kind of structure that I could find in the water. I was fishing a region that was getting quite a bit of pressure from other contestants. But with the Game Hawg, I could get bites where my other lures weren’t producing bites.

Question: What color Game Hawg were you using?

Niggemeyer: I fished several different colors, but green pumpkin and California craw were the two colors I used the most. I was pitching the Game Hawg past any visible target that I saw, retrieving it up to the target, bringing the Game Hawg up over the top of the brush and letting it fall on the other side. Once the Game Hawg jumped the brush, I’d let it sit on the bottom. Then I’d shake it, crawl it and hop it about 1/2-inch off the bottom. I wasn’t making very-long pitches, but I’d cover all the water between me and the target. I’d really saturate (make multiple casts to the same target) every piece of cover to which I pitched the Game Hawg.

I wanted to show that bait to as many fish as I could in the limited area I was fishing. Because the water was muddy and rising, and the Game Hawg was a small, compact lure, I think the bass could see it and eat it better. The other plus factor of course was because all the action of the appendages of the Game Hawg disturbed a lot of water and made the lure more visible to the bass. Remember, I wasn’t fishing for giant bass. A big fish in that tournament weighed about 3 pounds. So, the Game Hawg was the appropriate size and color and gave off enough action that when the bass did see the bait, they had no reason not to bite it. One of the things that’s important to remember is you can fish big baits all day long and not catch a big bass, if there aren’t any big bass in the place you’re fishing.

Therefore, always try to match the size of the lure you use to the size of the bass you expect to catch. In this tournament, remember I said I was struggling, so I felt like the more fish I could catch, the better my odds would be for not falling out of the running. I felt if I could catch a lot of bass, then I could cull-up to the best limit I could produce that day. Another factor that made this tournament tough was that the water was rising at the beginning of the tournament and falling toward the end of the tournament. Although I caught a lot of fish that wouldn’t measure, I learned that the Game Hawg would get bites and catch bass.

Some of the other contestants couldn’t get any bites and didn’t catch very many fish. I had to weed through a lot of small bass to finally get bigger bass. In tough tournaments, you need a bait that will get the bite first, because if you can’t make the bass bite, you don’t have a prayer of catching it. I also wanted a bait that would appeal to a variety of sizes of bass, so that I could catch bass that were big enough to measure and weigh-in. I found the Game Hawg to be just what I needed in that tournament.

Question: James, you’ve qualified for your second Bassmaster Classic. What will you know going into this second Classic that you didn’t know at the first Classic?

Niggemeyer: I’m going to be really excited to be going back to the Classic. But the jitters and excitement that I felt at the first Classic I hope won’t affect me as much when I make my second appearance. There’s only one first Classic, and that has to be special. But I’m glad to have the experience of my first Classic behind me now. I feel like I can go into this year’s Classic maybe a little-more confident and less nervous. Now I’m excited, no doubt, and I don’t know that I won’t be as nervous at the second Classic as I was at the first, but I hope not.

Question: What do you know about Lay Lake where the 2010 Classic will be held, and how do you plan to fish it?

Niggemeyer: Lay Lake in Alabama was where I fished my first Classic, and I finished 17th against the best bass fishermen in the world that year. So, I feel like the way I fished at my first Classic is pretty much how I’ll fish at this year’s Classic. But I feel like the reason I didn’t finish higher in my first Classic was because I didn’t find enough places to fish that had better-than-average bass. I’m going to try to have more locations to fish at Lay Lake that I believe will produce better-than-average bass than the places I had in the first Classic to fish.

The other advantage I feel like I’ll have is I’ll have some newer Strike King Baits than I had when I fished the first Classic, and I’ve got experience with those new lures. Also, in that first Classic I fished, I didn’t have as much confidence in some of the old Strike King lures as I do now, after having been out on the circuit for awhile. I’ve had plenty of time to learn how to fish more lures better, and I know the lake because I’ve fished it before. So, I’m feeling much-more confident going into the 2010 Classic than the first time I saw Lay Lake at my first year’s Classic.

Contents:

• Part 1: Fishing the Ocho
• Part 2: I'd Bet on the Rage Craw
• Part 3: Pure Poison Proved Deadly
• Part 4: Fishing the Rage Tail Lizard
• Part 5: The Importance of the Game Hawg in 2009