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Roy Hawk 2nd on Lake Mead WON BASS
Team Yamamoto's John Murray 7th; Jamie Cyphers 14th
By Russ Bassdozer

May 18-19, 2002

WON BASS South Pro/Am Tour - Lake Mead, Las Vegas, Nevada

"The main thing to me is how much it means to even be there. There is such a fine line between being able to be there - and not. I am fortunate to have a great support team - my wife, my friends and people who have helped me out every step all along the way. Some pro contenders may say of themselves, this is my job, or would want it to be their job someday. But I do not see it as a job, just an intense passion I have for the sport, and a love for the tournament fishing game. Part of that is a love for going through all the many struggles and challenges, to win against all odds. To me, that really is a part of it." - Roy Hawk

MAP WORK

A lot of guys may have opportunities to spend a lot of time pre-fishing. Typically, I have a bare minimum amount of pre-fishing time, but I compensate for this by doing a lot of homework studying maps, ascertaining what water levels will be come tournament time, and plotting map contours versus expected water levels.

I will always mark a blue contour on the map at 30 feet, and mark a red contour on my map at 20 feet. What this does is let me find new stuff and attractive structure between 20 to 30 feet on a map, based on current water levels, especially on a new lake I have not fished before.

The BASS event held during the fall at Columbia, Washington is a good example. Based on my map work, I determined I would fish a section of the Snake River. Now, I found out that very few people go there this time of year. Not typically a fall time deal. However, I could see what I wanted to see on the map, and I ended up getting a check. All map work instead of dock talk. I also used map work to do well at the BASS event on Oroville, California, coloring in water levels to identify the areas I would fish. Overall, I finished 34th this year on the BASS Western Open trail. Map work homework played a key role in that for me.

LOCAL AREA NETWORK

Another thing I have, perhaps most important of all, are great friends all around the country, fellows who fish in tournaments and have a pulse on the latest local tournament activity.

I do not ask them or even care what baits or colors caught fish for them, nor do I need to know a specific spot. I believe I will be able to figure out my own baits and spots when I get there. Besides, this type of information is not easily given anyway.

What I do seek, spend time talking about, and information that is freely given centers around biological clues. Examples such as whether there is grass or shad, or some other biological activity that's occurring.

LATEST TOURNAMENT FACTS

On tournament lakes, some sort of tournament (or several) may occur every weekend or every other weekend. One thing I always identify is what size daily bag (five fish) has it taken to win the latest events? What size is a tournament "big fish" lately? With this information, I know what daily bag size (five fish) and "big fish" I will need to win. Not only tournament-fishing friends help here, but tournament association web sites may post this data. When they do, there is even more information you can determine from tournament web sites. What is the average weight per fish? What percentage of the field weighed limits? In 2-3 day events, did catches go way up or way down from one day to the next, and why?

Then there are on-line weather sites that give hour by hour summaries of temperature, cloud cover and wind speed/direction for any zip code. Checking them daily gives a feel for morning weather, what time prevailing winds routinely rise, afternoon warming, nightly lows, and just getting into the daily weather swing for an upcoming tournament location.

PRE-FISHING

It's humorous but also serious that some friends and acquaintances think I lie about my pre-fishing, but it's just that I have a different way to go about it.

For instance, I won't throw a bait during pre-fish that I think will work. I usually just scan over an area, and avoid fishing it hard. Just being there gives me a feel for what may work during the tournament.

What this means is I may come back to the dock after a day of pre-fishing, and have little to share with buddies in terms of how many fish I caught, but then I go out and whack them during the tournament. So my pre-fish reports don't always match up to my tournament results.

Using the pre-fish on Lake Mead as an example, I pre-fished with one of my local friends, Jason, targeting the Muddy & Virgin Basins.

My sole objective was to get a good feel for how much fishable brush was left at the present low water levels. I simply scanned over a lot of spots that looked good to flip. However, I never let myself flip during pre-fish even though I knew it would definitely work. Instead, I used the pre-fish to try to open up or close the pattern. I knew my pattern would be flipping, so I used a variety of topwaters, which would let me raise fish out of spots and see how big they were, without hooking them. I also used a variety of crankbaits, catching a few on the Lucky Craft CB 350 model crankbait, but again simply trying to open up or close what I knew would essentially be a flip bite.

I spent about 3/4 of the day doing this, and located a lot of key bushes with good-looking shaded dark water on them. I believed I was grazing over a lot of good fish quickly, really not wanting to disturb them. So, I didn't stick a lot of fish, but I did find what I needed.

As you see from this example, my pre-fish results will be dramatically different from my tournament results. I really had no idea how much weight I would be able to flip out of this spot, however I believed they could be there, and went out and whacked them there during the tournament.

The tail end of the day, looking for some local fish to be able to cull on the way back to the launch ramp, we found some structure fish that were easy to catch off points with 3/4 ton spider jigs in 5 to 30 feet of water.

LAKE MEAD - DAY ONE

At the pair-off meeting that evening, I simply told my draw partner to plan on fishing local structure where I found deep fish at the tail end of the day, or we would throw crankbaits or go up lake to flip, that we would fish the conditions. Go where the wind blows.

At take-off, it felt good to make the long run. The surface was flat and we screamed up to the Virgin River. We started on a bluff wall with some good rock slides that felt good but we did not catch.

This gave way to some pea gravel and we cranked these banks until we went around the corner, and it opened up into pea gravel and brush. At this point, I just embraced the flipping deal. This was the beginning of the area I pre-fished, so I knew where all the key bushes were, and I focused on flipping moss green Big Boy jigs with Yamamoto's 3-Series 5" crawfish trailers in watermelon w/black & red flake (208), 16 lb. Sugoi line, a Quantum PT reel, and St. Croix flipping stick.

The flipping produced lots of small fish throughout the day. I was not impressed with the quality of the flip fish, but I was impressed with the brush we covered. So I circled back to the first area of brush we started on, intending to flip through the prime spots again. Back to the first area, getting late in the day now, I pulled a 2 3/4 pounder out of a bush, and we culled a couple more big fish that would make a difference.

Getting late now, we dropped back to the Muddy River. I had not pre-fished the Muddy, but knew from previous experience that bushes were there at this low water level. Essentially I would be pre-fishing the Muddy for day two tomorrow. We got right on some good bushes and culled with a 2 pounder.

With twenty minutes to fish before leaving for weigh-in, we found a double stretch of bushes, one deep stretch and a shallow stretch. We scanned the deep stretch first, cherry-picking the choicest spots. With only five minutes left, we began to scan the shallow stretch quickly.

Suddenly I sensed something and set the hook solid against a bush. For a few seconds, it seemed I could feel the rod throb every once in a while. I had a feeling that a fish may be on, but just couldn't get it unsnagged. I tried from all different angles, continuing for longer than you think you could wait. But still I believed a fish was there, even though there was no movement at all. Maybe gone. Finally, I maneuvered the boat right in on top of the bush, reeled the rod tip right down to the jig, and just stabbed the rod tip down to dislodge it.

At this point, the jig eye was wound in the rod tip guide, and the rod tip was inside the mouth of a 4.74 pounder! That bass came blasting out of the bush, doing cartwheels on the end of my rod tip! It was really cool. I'll always remember my shocked AAA partner shouting, "Oh my God, it's a hog!" while he got the net and held it under the fish.

I am not trying to pump up the Sugoi here, but it held up for about 4-5 minutes of me trying every possible way to pressure that fish free of the bush. The Sugoi line held up really good.

Of course, we wanted to finish fishing this stretch of bushes, but we had to go make weigh-in. Good thing we did too. The seas had built to six foot plus sweepers, one of which twisted the trolling motor so it would not stay pinned in the mounting bracket. We had to tie it down to keep from losing it. By the time we got back, there was deeper water in the boat than in some of the spots we had been fishing that day!

With day one over, we were second out of 124 boats. The 4.74 bass I caught on my rod tip won the Big Bass prize for day one of the tournament. In first place ahead of me by 3/4 pounds, was a fellow, Tim Klinger. Third place was two pounds down from me, quite a distance to be behind in this particular tournament.

LAKE MEAD - DAY TWO

Next day, at take-off, it was super still and ominous. Definitely the calm before the storm. While 7-8 miles below Echo Bay, we spied a bass boat adrift in the distance with its motor up. We changed course to go over to ask if they needed help. I had no idea how long they had been there, but they had a blown motor, and their trolling motor battery was run down, barely alive. With the day's forecast for high winds and rough seas, they were in a dangerous predicament. We ran into Echo Bay to get them help. In about a half-hour, we found someone who was not in the tournament who would call for a tow and stand by to assist them.

Once we got the disabled boat situation taken care of, we got back on course towards the same brush bank where I snagged (literally) the big one yesterday. In minutes, we caught our first flip fish, and just proceeded to pick that stretch apart. With a limit by 9 AM, the bite shut down after that. By 11 AM, we had only upgraded a couple of clones, no real help, just a few ounces more. By then, the wind picked up something awesome, and we battened down the hatches for a perilous trip back towards the Lower Basin. Huge 7-8 foot rollers coasted under us and over us. By the time we got back to the Lower Basin, we were thankful, but only able to land one more upgrade there, a couple of ounces again, before it was finish time.

Unboarding my AAA partner at the boat ramp, first place leader Tim Klinger yelled over to me as he recovered his boat onto the trailer, wanting to know from me, "Did you do it?"

"Nine pounds," I replied, and I could tell without needing any answer, "It's not going to be enough, is it?"

Relieved, Tim shook his head from side to side, certain now that the $45,000 winner's check would have his name on it. He had enjoyed an awesome day. Four flips into the day, he took a 5 pound plus, and he had a limit by 7 AM that was close to 15 pounds. So he just made the trip back to the Lower Basin while seas were still calm, to await the afternoon's weigh-in. Without any risk of returning in rough seas, he fished the rest of the day knowing he had it. Really cool for him.

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