Entry 337-1
Kevin VanDam’s Bass-Fishing Heroes
Editor’s Note: Generally we become the people we emulate the most. To be a great fisherman, you have to learn from great fishermen, and the men and the women who are your great fishing heroes will help make you the type of fisherman you want to become. This week, Kevin VanDam of Kalamazoo, Michigan, will tell us about his bass-fishing heroes, the men who have taught him the most, resulting in his becoming one of the world’s greatest bass fishermen. We’ll find out who have been VanDam’s mentors and teachers and the lessons he’s learned from these men that have helped him in his unbelievable career of tournament winnings.
Part 1: Learning the Mental Side of Fishing
Question: Kevin, who were your bass-fishing heroes?
VanDam: Growing up as a young fisherman, I looked up to and tried to learn from the best fishermen in the world. But not only did they help me learn how to fish the way they did, but more importantly, they taught me to learn my own strengths and weaknesses. I learned at a very-early age that I couldn’t fish like Denny Brauer, Rick Clunn, Larry Nixon, George Cochran or Mark Davis. But I could learn how to take their styles of fishing and apply it to my style of fishing. I really admired Denny Brauer. Like every other bass fisherman in America, I gravitated toward winners.
In my early bass-fishing days, Denny and Hank Parker were winning a lot of tournaments. Larry Nixon was Mr. Megabucks. Two guys who also helped me were Stacy King and Tommy Martin. Stacy, Tommy and I were on the Nitro Bass Fishing Team together. 
Tommy and Stacy helped me learn how to deal with sponsors and how to run the business side of being a tournament fisherman. When I was growing up reading “Bassmaster Magazine,” I admired the winners.
Question: What did you learn from Rick Clunn?
VanDam: Rick is a very-mental fisherman. He came from a background of systems and computing and logically determining how things should be. But in his fishing, Rick learned to abandon the logical and to concentrate on the mental side of fishing and seek perfection in his fishing. He’s had over 120 top-10 finishes, won over $3 million and the Bassmaster Classic four times, and is one of the most-respected anglers on the tournament circuit. I wanted to know how he was able to mentally achieve his accomplishments. Rick taught me to think about the variables I’d encounter out on the water, such as changing conditions and seasonal patterns and the science of bass fishing.
Rick was really one of the first fishermen to discover and use the intuitive side of fishing. 
He’d first store all the knowledge he could compile about seasonal patterns, weather conditions, different types of lures and techniques of fishing. Then he’d practice like the other competitors did. But on game day, the first day of the tournament, Rick was able to listen to that inner voice, his subconscious, and let it dictate how, where, when and for how long he’d fish. Rick explored the mental side of bass fishing more than anyone I knew. For a long time, he was misunderstood or not understood at all. But Rick was one of the first real intuitive fishermen I knew, and from Rick I learned how to fish by listening to my own mental voice. Today, that’s more of an accepted idea than it ever was in Rick’s heyday.
