A lot has gone down since my last post. I just finished fishing the Forrest Wood Cup in Pittsburgh and am now practicing for the 3^rd FLW Series event on Lake Dardanelle, AR. Pittsburgh was such an exciting week and I’m obviously sick about not winning the million dollars, but I was so blessed to have just been there and at least get into the top ten. What a great time it was seeing all my old friends, I just wish I would have had some time to visit with them, but it was very hectic as you can probably imagine. I couldn’t ask for anything more though, my entire family was there on the final two days, I got to lead the event on day one, and I had some unbelievable fish catches on day three and four that I will never ever forget, both of which I’m certain will make the TV show.

I want to thank everyone that cheered me on all week long, you guys rock! And for those of you who followed me around on the last two days in your boats, well I guess you got to experience the down side of pro fishing. I was wanting to hear you all explode when I caught one of those big ones, but I just couldn’t make it happen, as hard as I tried. I also want to thank Tom and Gwen Rizzo and Jimmy Lunsford for their help during the week. They made my life a lot easier and I appreciate everything greatly.

I caught almost everything I weighed in on a Tabu 5/16 oz green pumpkin/orange OW Series jig. I was thinning out the skirts dramatically and using a variety of very small Yamamoto trailers. The small needle-like hook was the absolute key to hooking those small fast fish in the heavy current. I did catch two (on day two) on a white Shad Shape Worm on a drop shot. I used 10lb Berkley 100% Fluorocarbon with the small jig and 6lb with the drop shot. My jig rod was a Setyr ECR 190MH with a ABU Revo Premier reel and the drop shot rod was a 6’9” DSR M with a ABU Soron spinning reel.

The only thing new in my sponsor world is Rapala’s new baits, which have been featured on my site and Basfan.com, click here to view. Also, we are very close to releasing the new Kinami Bug. It is already a killer bait obviously, but I wanted to change a couple minor things to make it even better. It is really looking good and I can’t wait to get my grubbies on it soon. Tabu baits are starting to show up in more stores. Our hand-poured baits, the Whip Tail Worm and Tiny Tim are selling very well and were going to play a huge role for me in Pittsburgh on the final two days had the water not gotten high and muddy, I promise you.

I now plan on fishing the rest of the Strens and again think that this will probably be my last year fishing them, ha ha! Who knows though, there are two of them left and then the championship on Pickwick Lake which I look forward to. I love that place in the Fall. I have one more PAA event on Toledo Bend, TX before the PAA Classic on Lake Conroe, TX, but I may not have to fish it to qualify, so if that’s the case, I will not see Toledo Bend this year. I am ranked 11^th in the PAA point standings and the top 20 qualify to fish Conroe in October for $250,000. They tell me I’m locked in, so I will have to do a little math before deciding what I need to do. My next event after Dardanelle is a Stren on Lake Champlain, NY which I’m obviously excited about. I need a good whack-fest tournament after these last two. This event at Dardanelle is going to be extremely tough; I just hope I can figure out how to scrounge up 7 or 8 pounds a day.

That about does it for me, but before I take off, I wanted to give a full account of the first fish I ever caught in a tournament while sitting down on the job.

Here’s my Forrest Wood Cup day four story:

At the very end of the last day, I had zero fish in the live-well and was totally exhausted and disgusted. When I got to the Emsworth lock I decided to take my chances and stay to fish until the last minute possible. So while everyone else was heading back, I stayed behind and kept fishing the big fish spot that I caught the 4 pounder on the day before, also in the final minutes. I knew that a barge was in the bigger lock, but I was told that the smaller of the two locks was reserved for FLW Tour vessels so I really was not concerned, plus I didn’t have any fish anyway…nothing to loose. Well as it got closer to check in time I decided to head to the lock and pull the signal cord. After I pulled the cord I went back over to the magic spot to fish a little more until I heard the lockmaster blow the horn, signaling it was time for me to enter the lock.

Time continued to tick away and the horn never blew. Before I knew it I realized that I was not going to make it to check in on time. Our average lock time had been at least 40 minutes all week, so at 3:45 (check in time was 4:10) I called the tournament director and explained my situation. The previous day I locked back at 3:20. I’d been in this dilemma many times before on the Three Rivers, returning to the weigh-in site after dark to an empty parking lot. I did not want to be hearing the crickets after sundown, but that’s exactly what I thought was going to happen. I was sick.

We could see that they were using the small lock for the tug boat and the larger one for the barges so I told Bill Taylor (the tournament director) I’d likely be there for at least a couple hours, and possibly longer. My only concern was making it back to the weigh-in at Mellon Arena, I didn’t care if I didn’t have any fish to show, I just wanted to get there on time, see everybody, and not miss the experience of a lifetime. So we made plans for someone to come get me by trailer just in case.

I idled out away from the lock, took my life jacket off and joked, “Well, here we are for the night.” to my camera man and camera boat driver. I’ve had these guys many times over the past 6 years, there names are Jeff and Larry and believe me, we have been through a lot together on the water. It’s a true blessing to have friends like them with me, always encouraging me during tough times. They know how hard I worked over the last two days and how much of a struggle it was for me out there and they, like me, always stay positive. So here we where at the end of a long tiresome week and we’ve been eaten by the “Lock Monster.”..perfect!

Jeff, my camera man asked me if I wanted to do the video wrap up now, or wait until we got back to the truck. I said let’s get all that stuff out of the way now so we can relax. So for some reason I decided to idle back to the sweet spot. I sat down on the front deck and was thinking about what I wanted to say. Jeff kept moving around trying to get the lighting and angles right, and when he was ready, he said go. So I fired out a cast to the same spot I caught the 4 pounder the day before and begun to talk to the camera about our lock situation. Keep in mind that I made that same cast about 5000 times that day already without a bite. With the camera rolling, I’m not real sure exactly what I was saying, when all of the sudden my rod jerked down and I felt a fish swimming with my jig. I jumped up as fast as I could and said something about I can’t believe this, or this can’t be a bass. Then it jumped a time or two and I swung it into the boat in disbelief. I was really in shock, I just fished my hoo haws off for 8 hours without a single keeper and then I sit down and catch one with no time left…on my butt? It was crazy. Now, all I could think about was not screwing up this live video by saying something stupid. I mean, this is amazing and the world is going to remember this one for a long time. Then it dawned on me that technically we were not late yet and I snapped into panic-mode. I knew it would take a small miracle, but I believe in miracles for sure, always have, always will. So I yelled, “Lets go, we have to get back, we can do this, we have to get back!”

All of this happened pretty fast, I looked at the time and I think it was 3:51. I rambled something to the cameraman and frantically put my life vest on and flew over to the lock. As I came around the lock wall the doors were miraculously beginning to open. I idled quickly toward the doors and saw a huge paddle-wheeled tour boat and the tug boat. I tried to squeeze between the wall and the tour boat when the lock workers ran out and motioned for me to turn around and get out of the way. So I waited for the tour boat to clear and again began idling into the lock. Again I got yelled at and had to turn around once more. The lock master told me to wait for the horn, so I did. It seemed like forever, but as soon as the tug was out of the lock, the horn finally blew and was headed in as fast as I could.

The lockmaster, John Lockron (I think) was the coolest, fastest lock dude ever. He had that hook down in seconds and pulled it up even faster. He was yelling commands to the lock tenders and went way beyond the extra mile for me. They were smooth and efficient, and I think a little excited about the challenge. When the door closed I had exactly 15 minutes to get to downtown Pittsburgh, can you imagine? Even the lockmaster said I’d never make, but we’ll do this as fast as we can. He told us to hang on because it was going to be rough, and it sure was. I was doing the simple math in my head and figured I had about a 6 mile run back on a sunny Sunday afternoon. I new there would be pleasure boats everywhere and big waves to deal with, but I new if I could somehow make it back on time, this one fish could be worth thousands of dollars, so I prayed. I then made my camera man jump out of my boat and into the camera boat so I didn’t have to worry about hurting him or is equipment. I would also gain a couple miles per hour that might end up making the difference.

John said that I could untie my boat early and idle to the front of the lock and go on plane as soon as I felt I could squeeze the boat through. So I got up to the wall and did just that. My Ranger touched the doors on both sides and I blasted through the tiny hole and was going 68 miles per hour at 4:04, still inside the lock walls. The cut boats we all have to use during the top 10 days are not set up like my personal boat with a foot throttle, so I just pushed the hammer down and held on to the wheel with both hands. It was a rough ride, one in which I was in the air as much as in the water, but old dependable Yamaha got me back with 20 seconds to spare. I broke down right then. It may sound corny; I knew I lost the tournament, but after such a mentally grueling week I was just so thankful that it ended in a positive, and that God gave me a small miracle instead of the sound of crickets in the dark. Our God is an awesome God, and every once in a while he reminds me just how “in charge” he really is. I think we all need that from time to time.

So I got to be a part of the final weigh-in after all. I got to see all my friends and family and hear the crowd roar. It was an amazing week and one I will never forget. I wouldn’t change a thing if I could, the memories were worth so much more than a million bucks!

Dave