LSS Championship Headed to Lake Sam Rayburn
Posted: 2/24/2011
The City of Lufkin and Lake Sam Rayburn will play host to the 2011 Lone Star Series Championship presented by Bass Pro Shops and Nitro Performance Bass Boats on October 22nd and 23rd.
Based at beautiful Cassels Boykin Park in Angelina County, this event will feature qualifying teams from the Central and North Divisions as they compete for the 2011 Nitro Z7 grand prize valued at $25,000. The tournament registration and angler appreciation dinner will be held at Pitser Garrison Civic Center on Friday, October 21st from 5-7pm. The Championship off limits will be October 10-19 with official practice days being held on October 20-21.
The Lone Star Series is a Texas based team stringer bass series presented by Bass Pro Shops and Nitro Performance Bass Boats. The series features Central and North Divisions with four spring events in each division that culminates in a team championship in October. Teams may qualify for the championship by finishing in the top 50% of AOY points or by fishing 3 of the 4 events in a division. For more information regarding the Lone Star Series please visit lonestarseries.com.
Lufkin is considered the regional hub in East Texas, which includes 12 surrounding counties and is known for its forests that stretch for several miles. Residents enjoy an outstanding quality of life including excellent schools, beautiful parks and open spaces, cultural arts, and a broad range of recreational activities. For more information regarding Lufkin please visit visitlufkin.com and for more information regarding Lake Sam Rayburn please visit click here.
New Lake Austin Record
Posted: 2/1/2011
TJ Nissen caught his first largemouth bass over 10 pounds from Lake Austin on January 27, 2011. Catching your first double-digit bass is a very special moment for most anglers, and quite frankly the majority of bass anglers go their entire lifetime without accomplishing this goal. To make things sweeter, TJ’s fish also qualified for the Texas Parks and Wildlife ShareLunker Program and was certified as the lake’s new record.
TJ gave us the tale of the fish that took the Central Texas fishing community by storm, and left the over 15 year old 14.35 pound lake record in the dust!
Lake Austin is currently drawn down to allow home owners to repair their docks and to let some of the vegetation die. I was fishing with Kevin Hoes who is a high school friend of my son. We put in at City Park around 1:30 pm Thursday afternoon. Two years ago my son and I had a lot of success throwing crank baits parallel to the rocks above City Park, so that’s where we started.
Not too long into the trip I hooked what felt to be a good fish but it turned out to be a hybrid; fun, but not what we were fishing for. A few casts later another hybrid and I started thinking maybe we should have brought a cooler and kept these guys for a fish fry!
As the day wore on we only managed one small keeper bass. As it got closer to dark we headed back to the ramp, fishing along the way. We were having engine trouble so we headed back a little early. When we got back there was still daylight left so I suggested that we try the rocks across from the park. The water against that particular bluff was deep and I wasn’t making any contact with my crank bait so I switched to a bigger version of the same bait (Bomber Fat Free Shad in a Citrus Shad color). I still was not hitting the rocks like I wanted, but I noticed up ahead that there was a dock where the piers were still in the water so we worked our way up to it.
I told Kevin that this dock, being one of the only ones left in the water, probably got fished pretty often but we might as well give it a try. He was throwing a swim bait so I tried to get him set up to throw at the piers; we each made several casts at the piers. When we were positioned in front of the dock I had a fairly clear shot under it. I cast my crank bait and it landed perfectly just off the bank and about a foot off the back pier allowing me to retrieve it perpendicular to the bank and parallel to the piers.
On about crank three she hammered it! I set the hook and it was so solid it felt like I was stuck in a rock, but then I felt her head shake and she started stripping drag. She ran towards the piers first, and then to deep water (thank goodness). I told Kevin whatever it was, it was BIG. She finally surfaced the first time and we knew it was a bass, and big one, but no clue how big. Kevin worked the trolling motor to keep us in deeper water. She made several hard runs and came up three times to shake her head. The first time she came up I could see there was only one hook in her; Kevin kept telling me to keep her head down but I was so worried that if I changed the rod angle the hook was going to come out. She came to the boat green three times, it was nerve racking!!!
Finally she was played out and on the fourth time she came in, mouth closed, and Kevin did an amazing job lipping her (we had no net) and getting her into the boat. Then the shaking took over. I’ve had buck fever before, but this bass had me shaking uncontrollably. I am not even really sure what happened in the first few minutes after she was in the boat…but I’m pretty sure I said “Holy S**t” a few dozen times! And then I said what I thought I would never say in my life, “Dude, that might be a lake record!”
Then the impact of the catch started to sink in…what do we do now? This is when great friends and family come to the rescue. One friend brought us a cooler and another one brought us an aerator. My son got me the number for ShareLunker; we paged Dave Campbell and he called right back and was quickly headed to Austin. My son drove in from San Marcos and a couple other friends drove out to meet us at the lake. My beautiful wife brought us some Please Release Me and then went and got us all pizza! What a great wife to be able to understand this insanity. My daughter came out to take pictures for me.
We waited in the park until it closed at 10 pm because we wanted to move the fish as little as possible. Dave and his crew finally arrived in Austin, we met up with him and got the official weight at 16.03 pounds!
We took some pictures and off she went to Athens. I opted to have her brought back to Lake Austin when they are done with her; TPWD said they would call me so I could be there when she was released.
This fish was beautiful! Not a mark on her. All her fins and tail were absolutely perfect, she was the picture of health. This has truly been an experience of a lifetime and I am so happy that I got to share it with my family and some great friends!
TJ’s fish was 28.5 inches long and measured 21.75 inches in girth, only three other fish entered into the Toyota ShareLunker program have been that long. The new Lake Austin record is number 22 on the list of 50 biggest bass caught in Texas.
Congratulations TJ on a truly spectacular catch! When asked where he could possibly go from here he responded, “OK, here is my first bass since ‘The One’…might as well start back small and work my way up again!”
GrandeBass Introduces New 5.5″ Flash
Posted: 1/13/2011
If you know anything about GrandeBass, it is that they dominate the competition with new innovations. GrandeBass’ newest creation does just that. Fluke style bait meets RattleSnake with a major twist that equals the GrandeBass Flash. This innovative product design turns your favorite jerk or swim bait into a darting, swimming, air-breathing, vibration displacing, life-like fish-catching dominator. From the weekend angler to the top professional competitor, you will experience more fish-ability and more strikes with the GrandeBass Flash than you thought possible.
Five colors, Green Pumpkin, Watermelon Red, Trophy Hunter, Watermelon Seed/Chartreuse and White, are now available and a 6 ct bag will be $4.49.
Stay tuned for soon to be released colors including Real Shad, Disco Violet, Blue Pearl Magic, Watermelon Magic, Ssabednarg, Houdini and Arkansas Shiner.
There are many possibilities with this new soft jerk bait – you can swim it or walk it, but perhaps the Flash’s most exciting characteristic appears when you kill it on slack line. This lure will actually turn on its following prey and then it’s lights out…this bait will hunt!
TTZ team member Don Gordon has been fishing the Flash prototype and worked with Jerry to help make the Flash the best entry into this style of bait.
“The Grande Bass 5.5″ Flash is probably one of the most thought out soft plastic baits ever developed. I worked with Jerry Shinn for over 2 years to develop a swim–jerk bait utilizing the RattleSnake as a base. Jerry came up with the basic concept of what you see here, but we went round and round about the tail. We did prototypes from a fin tail to a cocahoe thumper tail; I was lobbying for a V tail and Jerry came through big time with the vented V tail. This is the best of the soft plastic swim-jerk baits I have ever used,” said Gordon.
Don and Jerry tested the final concept in a pool and immediately knew it was a winner! When the final mold arrived Jerry heated plastic in the microwave, poured the hot mixture into a large syringe and injected it into the mold; he then went to a local pond and caught a fish on his second cast!
Don suggests rigging the Flash two ways: For shallow and weightless presentations he prefers a 4/0 Daiichi XPoint hook; the rate of fall is very slow and you can let the Flash seductively sink through the water column or burn it across the top. For deeper applications Don prefers a 4/0 1/8 oz weighted hook with a Hitchiker screw lock.
The GrandeBass Flash is now only available online at GrandeBass.com; local retailers including Academy, Cabela’s, Gander Mountain, Walmart and Dicks will stock them shortly. The Flash will also be available soon online at AnglersProTackle.com, TackleWarehouse.com and TexasBassTackle.com.
Grande’s newest entry into the soft jerk bait category is sure to take the fishing world by storm. Finally, a soft jointed jerk bait with a ribbed RattleSnake body, hook slot, vented tail and doused in Grande’s patented Mega3 juice…what more could you ask for?
New Falcon Lake Record
Posted: 1/10/2011
Tommy Law, a well known guide on Falcon Lake, accomplished one of his lifetime goals on Friday, January 7, 2011 when he broke a nearly 20 year old lake record for black bass. Falcon is a world renowned fishery for trophy sized bass but with the events from last year, the lake has experienced a downturn in guide trips and fishing pressure. Some predicted the record would fall this spring; and with the lake fishing better than ever in recent years, even the stories of lake pirates couldn’t keep the die hard anglers away from chasing their fish of a lifetime. Texas Tournament Zone spoke with Tommy to gain some insight about his epic day on the water; and here’s the story about the one that didn’t get away!
Tommy was guiding Jeff Archie and his wife Stephanie, they were from Tennessee and this was their first time on Falcon. The first spot they stopped at was a drain coming off a spawning flat that Tommy had done well at a couple of weeks ago, and Jeff’s first fish was a fish of a lifetime for most of us.
“We were there about ten minutes and Jeff’s first fish was a 13 lb 0 oz monster; this fish was a brute and not a mark on her! Jeff caught her on a 3/4 oz football jig in 16 feet of water. She was 27 inches long and 21.5 inches in girth. I caught a seven pounder there as well,” said Law.
Stephnie was not getting bit so they decided to make a move about 20 miles to get her on a bite. It worked because she caught three real quick with one that went about 6 pounds.
“I got a phone call while we were there and a buddy of mine had a monster he wanted me to weigh and take a picture of; she went 12 lb 14 oz. After he left I decided that we would go to a place where I had a 41 lb 15 oz stinger a week or so ago.”
They pulled up on the spot, a ledge that went from 16 to about 24 feet, and made a cast and it was on; Stephanie had an 8 or 9 pounder to the top but she came off. The group caught several good fish including another 7 pounder…the big bass were loaded up and they were getting bit on almost every cast. And then it happened, around 3:00 PM Tommy decided to make one more cast.
“I made a cast a little farther out and when I picked up on the Texas rigged Watermelon Magic Magnum Fluke it felt like mush, so I just set the hook. I did not move her at all for a second or two and then all heck broke out! She surfaced out there and I told Jeff that we had another Share Lunker on; I got her to the boat and Jeff grabbed her and said, ‘Man she is bigger than mine,’ speaking of his earlier 13 pounder.”
“I put her on the scale and I saw 15 lb 9 oz pop up. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me so I ask Jeff to look and he said 15 lb 9 oz. I called James Bendele at Falcon Lake Tackle and he met me at the county ramp; we certified her at 15.63 pounds.”
Tommy’s fish replaced the existing lake record of 15.12 pounds set back on May 1, 1991. Both Share Lunkers were released back into the lake and they both swam away healthy and strong; their best five fish would have weighed 47 pounds 9 ounces!
Congrats Tommy on a well deserved record! To book a trip with Tommy or to learn more about Falcon Lake, you can contact him at 325-439-6045 or tommy@falconlakeguide.com. You can also visit his Outlaw Guide Service website at falconlakeguide.com.
