D and R Trail Muskegon Lake 6-7-14

[1javelin]

TCook and I teamed up for the D and R Trail this year, and the first event was on my birthday up at Muskegon Lake.  Here is a recount of our time.

Thursday: We started off knowing that there would be fish on beds, so we went looking.  We spent the whole day checking shallows in the dirty water and found a few good fish.  We noticed a lot of other boats doing what we were, and knew that getting to our fish first would be a problem since I am still having boat issues.  We figured that with the fish we found, if we got to one of our areas first, we could come close to the 20 mark.  Confidence.

Friday: We got a late start after a late night, and needing to go and put gas in the boat to cover all the running we had been doing.  We vow to develop a better technique for this.  We went and did the same thing today, checking the same fish, and running into the same people and some new ones that were doing the same thing.  I noticed that the fish we had in one area all had white marks on their lips, which told me that some people were having more fun prefishing than they should have been.  It's frustrating, but I guess that is part of the challenge of a big tournament.  We also noticed quite a few workers on the docks that were fishing for some of the fish we had found, and were catching them too.  We found a big smallie on a bed and were convinced noone else had found it, so we went back to check on it at the end of the night.  Apparently we spent a little too long looking at it.  More on that later.

Saturday: Tournament day, and we had to go get gas again in the boat (this is getting expensive!!).  We had a plan; if we were top ten we were running across the lake to a group of fish we knew would get hammered, if we were first flight then we would go to our second group that we thought would be a little harder for others to find, and if we were second flight we were going to our big fish that we thought noone found.  We drew 41, first boat of the second flight.  Decision made.  We showed up where our big fish was, and started fishing for almost 30 minutes without a bite.  We finally started creeping up on it to see if it maybe had relocated, and the boat owner next to our fish came out to tell us that some kid saw us there the night before and came over to proceed and snag the fish.  Not cool, because it was not there anymore.  We then went to our next spot, our second choice.  We fished around and caught a few, then tried for a 4 pound smallie we had on a bed.  After almost 2 hours and only one possible bite, we decided to leave.  At this time Snyder came in and asked us if the fish was still there, and we watched as they proceeded to work it.  We caught up with them later, on the same fish, and we backed off it and gave it to them since it would help them upgrade about a pound and  we were out of contention for the win as of that point.  Noone ended up with that fish.  We caught a few guarders and went to the weigh in thinking we had around 13 pounds.  We ended up with 13.93 pounds and took 11th out of the 80 boats that were present.  We were obviously disappointed that our plan didn't quite work out, but we were ok with that finish.  Next up is White Lake, postspawn, so it should be a great time!

1jav

[TCook]

That was indeed a tough tournament. When you get 0 out of 8 good ones due to pressure and takeoff position the day is going to be a battle to stay positive. Be happy with 11th, some tournaments work out in your favor some don't you just gotta make the most of the cards your dealt with homie.

[Firefighter Jeff]

    So your saying 69 other boats finished below you   Sounds good to me.  I'd be happy.  Not the goal you set out to do but hey, not everyone can win money !!  Nice job guys and interesting report Herman.