I just got back from competing in the FLW National Guard College Fishing Central Regional on Kentucky Lake this past weekend. Our first practice day was greeted with cloudy skies and rain. We started in a creek arm down south and found plenty of fish but they were mainly short fish. We found schools of bass busting on windy points and we could catch them on a variety of baits but they were mostly small. Working our way back in the creek, we found that the fish were really relating to the channel swing points. Whenever we would pull up on a set of docks or a point with the channel hitting it we would start getting bit.  During practice it seemed like the keeper fish liked a spinnerbait over anything else. We had what appeared to be a couple of nice fish come off of docks and swirl on our spinnerbaits.  As our practice day was coming to a close it started to rain and it would continue to rain the entire night.

The first day of the tournament we decided to scratch our area that we pre fished in because we mainly caught short fish and decided to concentrate our efforts on Johnathan Creek. We were going to take what we learned from fishing the Blood River and apply it to that creek because we knew that a lot of fish had been released there the past couple of weekends. We went to the bridge and started fishing it and the next couple of points down with just a couple bites. We went and fished the docks in a shallow creek and didn't have but a couple of shorts to show for it. We decided to make our way out of the creek hitting as many docks as we possibly could where the channel swung close to the bank. Mike caught keeper number one a 3lber on a spinnerbait out the front of the boat. We kept on fishing our pattern and I was able to connect with 3 more keepers out the back of the boat before the sun came out. When the sun came out our shallow spinnerbait bite died off and we started fishing windy points with rattle traps. I caught one more keeper that we wouldn't be able to weigh because you can only weigh 3 fish per an angler in College Fishing. We were hammering the shorts but Mike McCarthy couldn't find a  keeper before we had to leave to head back to weigh in. Our 4 keepers gave us 9lbs 6 oz which put us in 5th place out of 20 on day one.

The forecast for Sunday was calling for sunshine with little wind. We were a bit nervous because our shallow water spinnerbait bite started to die with the sun coming out. We decided to head back to Johnathan creek on the second day to try and make it work one more time. In the first two hours of fishing we put about 15 fish in the boat and I had one keeper. The fish had changed from the day before. We were in the last flight on day number 2 and we found Indiana University fishing in our area when we got there. They caught their fish on the bridge back in Johnathan creek and we even fished alongside them for a while. This spot would end up producing the winning sack of the tournament. The fish were not on the bridge the first day. We fished it without a bite but the second day as the water came up and the fish moved in as the current increased in the area.   Since  Indiana University camped out on the bridge and our spots were not producing  we made a move to Anderson Creek where Mike was able to put keeper number two in the boat on a Carolina rigged centipede in the first 5 minutes when we got there.

After fishing Anderson Creek for a while we bounced around trying to find active fish and this didn't work and it was a costly decision to have left Johnathan Creek after looking back at it.  We had a cold front move in the night before and it is possible that the bite might have turned on later in the day for us and maybe if we had stayed in Johnathan creek we would have been able to have caught one more keeper before the end of the day. Hindsight is always 20/20 and  missing out of the money and a trip to the National Championship by one place and that we almost were in the right spot at the right time to win the whole tournament is a bit hard to stomach.   The rule that you can only weigh 3 fish per an angler is very frustrating. We've missed out on two top 5 finishes now because of it. I guess the rule is there to make sure it is the best TEAM that wins. Our two keepers ended up going about 4 and a half pounds to give us a two day total of 14lbs 4 oz which put us 1lb out of making the top 5 cut and fishing the final day for first place. I would like to kick myself for the decisions we made on day two but there's nothing that I can do about it now. The only thing we can do is learn from the experience and get them next year.

The setup I used to catch my spinnerbait fish was a 6 foot 9 AiRRUS Ultra XL rod in medium heavy with a Abu Revo SX spooled with 20lb GAMMA High Performance Co-Polymer Line.  My trap fishing setup was a 7 foot AiRRUS Copperhead Cranking Stick and a high speed Abu Revo STX spooled with 14lb GAMMA High Performance Co-Polymer line.

Article by Truman State University Collegiate Angler Spencer Clark