Quick story about Easter and a Bassmaster Classic. Tonight's the night on the calendar when Jesus prayed, "Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done."
That was represented in a scene in Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" movie that mystified me before I surrendered my life to Jesus. At the time I was wondering why Jesus wasn't scared.
Anyhow, I'd watched the movie pretty near to one Classic (can't remember which one), and in the Classic media room I ended up asking Alton Jones, who was fishing that Classic, and B.A.S.S. shooter Andy Crawford about it. They were pretty stoked to talk to me about it, and I really appreciated the convo. One of many moments in my bassin' journey where I can now see God pointing me at Himself, if that makes sense.
Just a little of what goes down at Classics! Highly recommend watching that movie – it's amazing no matter where you're at.
Let's get to it! Oops one more thing – April is "national frog month." So git out there and do yer froggin' duty! Pretend you're Dean Rojas for at least 1 day! 😁
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If your email program cuts off the bottom of the email click "View this email in your browser" up top to see the whole thing. Sorry bout that – email programs keep changing stuff.
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Cool deets about Gussy's winning bait, the Z-Man Scented Jerk ShadZ
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Some interesting stuff from a recent Z-Man post – check it:
Action
> Gussy: "...put it in the water and it absolutely springs to life, does things few other baits can do; operates on those super subtle levels of body and tail movement, so critical to triggering sight-feeding bass."
> The Jerk ShadZ's ElaZtech [plastic] enabled Z-Man to build the bait with an ultra-thin slice of material separating torso from tail, resulting in free-flowing tail movement – a huge reason the bait shines for Gussy's deliberate presentation.
> "Sometimes moping works best just by holding the rod still and letting the Jerk ShadZ hover in place. Even at rest, though, the bait's tail keeps waving and shivering. Bass eyes, which are keyed to movement, easily discern these restrained actions."
Presentation
> Gussy: "Something we discovered many years ago, that's critical to a vertical jig and plastic presentation, is that the [ElaZtech] material makes the bait hover and sit nice and horizontal in the water." The jighead tips just slightly down...while the bait's forked tail lingers but rarely stops moving entirely....
> Gussy: "If you rig a similar, non-ElaZtech bait on the same jighead, the bait sinks and rides tail down, which just doesn't look right to the bass. When the presentation largely hinges on a lack of exaggerated swimming motion, you've got to show fish something that appears natural and that moves on those subtle levels – especially when you're hanging a minnow" (Gussy's term for the technique more commonly known as moping.)
Durability
> "In tournaments or everyday fishing, you can't discount the efficiency factor – the power to hook and land dozens of bass on a single bait without re-rigging."
> The night before each day at the Bassmaster Classic, Gussy rigged approximately half a dozen Jerk ShadZ on Smeltinator Jigheads. ...he locked each bait in place with a drop of superglue, applied to the jig collar.
> "In essence I had 6 completed lures, color-matched and rigged straight, and perfectly aligned to swim without spinning. And I never had to worry about little bass or other nuisance fish pulling the bait down the jig collar or pecking the tail off. Never had to reel up to check on the bait – such a little detail, but such a difference maker too.
> "Lots of times, when you're working a hot school you've got to get back down immediately after missing a bite or catching a bass. If you have to stop between bites to re-rig or push the bait back onto the collar, often it's already too late and you've missed your window.
> "Only reason I switched baits to start each day was because I wanted to go in with a fresh bait loaded with scent."
More
> To increase buoyancy of the Jerk ShadZ's head, torso or tail, Gussy stretches the bait in that specific section. Stretching sheds its built-in salt, allowing the buoyant properties of ElaZtech to shine.
> Luke Clausen: ""The Jerk ShadZ is a longtime secret of guys on the Great Lakes and beyond. On lakes like Erie, St. Clair and all the way out to the Columbia River, we discovered the bait's success on a dropshot and won a lot of money.
> "You can nose-hook the bait once and never worry about it pulling free. In the water, the bait sits naturally horizontal and stays in the strike zone – won't sink to the bottom and die like most other baits."
Sounds like if the bite is tough, go 4". If it's not as tough, go 5".
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5 Qs with Smeltinator Jighead creator Bryan "no relation" Gustafson
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Come to find out that there's like a thousand Gustafsons where Gussy lives, and allegedly they're not related...which I guess means there had to be multiple Gustafs at one point? Several points? 😁
Anyhow, Bryan is Gussy's bud from way back, is a tourney fisherman who I think actually beat Gussy sometimes, owns a couple fishing/hunting stores, and started making his own jigs and jigheads in high school – and got onto this Smeltinator design 15+ years ago. Here's 5 with him:
1. How did the Smeltinator come about?
> "It came about for the exact reasons you saw last week. I made it in 2007, and the reason we did it was...back then there was no Z-Man. [Berkley Power Minnows] was the secret back then, but if you used a mushroom head – we didn't know about super glue – it would just tear. So you would get 1 bass and be sitting down and trying to rig up another minnow....
> "We had that conical [keeper] design, but we weren't the first ones to do it. Lunker City made a ball head with the conical thing so we kind of took that and made a minnow head. Northland made a minnow head but it had a walleye hook and a bad keeper for the bait.
> "[Northland Tackle founder] John Peterson actually helped me out...without him I don't think it would've happened actually.
> "It was just something we needed and it kind of expanded form there."
2. How did Gussy hear about it – was he involved in creating it?
> "I grew up on Rainy Lake 2 hours away and he grew up on Lake of the Woods where we both are now. I used to stay at his house for all the tournaments. I'd give him jigs and whatnot...and he's always been great to me.
> "He definitely had some influence. He was the one who said we need to get a Gammy hook in this thing and a minnow head and a keeper, so I'd say he definitely helped influence it."
[He said the head has not changed since 2007.]
> "Actually [in 2012] Cory Johnston got us to start making the 1/8-oz so he and Chris could use it with a little 2.8 Keitech [swimming it]. That was their secret for a while [on the Great Lakes] but it kind of got out of the bag.... We never made a green pumpkin or 1/8-oz mini-hook one til they got us to make that."
3. What's different about it vs other Damiki-type jigheads?
> "It's been knocked off 100 times now, but it has a good hook, a good conical keeper that seems to work on all baits...a realistic head. It's good, it's been around a long time, and we have good colors to match the baits you need.
> "Some of the colors on other ones aren't that great. The thing is, when you're doing this [moping/Damiki], you want to it to be as realistic as possible because the fish get a real chance to get a good look at it."
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4. How do you fish it? Do you like the Z-Man Jerk Shadz too?
> "Exact same [as Gussy] pretty much. We use a lot more of the 5-inch Jerk Shadz up here, but pretty much the same deal."
That smelt color too?
> "I know it's called 'smelt' but it can be whatever you want to be. That's like the most natural baitfish-colored one, and we use the 'smokey shad' a lot and 'shiner.' They're the most natural ones."
5. What are the most important things bass-heads need to know about the Smeltinator or this technique?
> "Live sonar definitely helps with this. Before, you kinda knew but kinda didn't know... What Jeff did last week is a great example of it...when it works, you have those little windows that are unbeatable. A lot of our major tournaments up here are won doing that.
> "What Jeff did was a perfect representation of it. ...it's a lot harder than it looks. Doing nothing is the right thing to do, but you also have to be around the fish.
> "We live on probably the rockiest lake in North America...and we are used to pulling them out of the structure without seeing them on our sonar. Side imaging was the biggest advantage we had...you could find those 4-wheeler or snowmobile-sized boulders, go drop a bait on it and [the fish] pop out.
> "Even the flat-bottom humps here, the ones that don't have the [big] boulders – even though it looks like flat bottom, [fish] will still come out of it.
> "I think a lot of guys are so used to seeing the fish before you're fishing for them...which I think helped [Gussy]. When he found the structure he won the tournament on, I think he had the knowledge to go fish them and not just scan them.
> "It's something you gotta try. It looks boring on TV, but it works. It seems to work all over the country, and anytime they're deep it's gonna be a player."
More smeltinatin'
1. He says that a bigger hook on that head would not be good. The hooks size plus the head detail gets smallmouths to eat it headfirst and get hooked.
2. Although Gussy did use the "smelt" color Jerk Shadz, he did NOT use the "smelt" color Smeltinator head – he actually used a newer color called "opening night:"
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So his Classic bait looked like this, posted by Bryan:
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3. Gussy said moping is the same exact deal as fishing a Damiki rig, just way cooler...😁
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New Berkley bait for forward-facing sonar?
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Stealing this from Brett at Target Walleye, which is the BassBlaster of walleye/ice fishing:
This new (not out yet) bait called the Berkley PowerBait Switch is specifically designed for forward-facing sonar:
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I've seen a few quickie (blurred-out) teaser pics of this new gem sprinkled in Instagram stories...but there's finally a bunch of info that was just made public in this episode of The Next Bite TV where John Hoyer and Owen Wilcox were fishing a small MT reservoir.
It's a pre-rigged soft plastic (will come in 6 sizes from 1.75" up to 5") that John Hoyer says "has the stiffness to be able to have some of those glide bait characteristics." [What walleye guys call a glide bait is NOT the same as a bass fishing glide bait/swimbait. The OG walleye glide bait is the Rapala Jigging Rap "ice jig."]
Here's a few of the different ways he's fishing it from about the 11:01 mark of the video:
> "When you rip it, it actually vibrates like a blade bait…when you let it freefall, it meanders down to the bottom. ...can pop it on slack like...a lot like we work a lot of glide baits...allows the bait to dart back and forth...as much as 3' or 4'.
> "Another great action on this bait...I call it the 'scurrying goby'...so on the Great Lakes, especially where there's forage on the bottom...just turn the reel handle, and then stop it...let it coast down to bottom. This bait has a cool little shimmy to it...a little tail wag...wobbles almost like a shallow-diving crankbait....
> "...on forward-facing sonar...pop it in place. When fish aren't super active...give that fish as many looks as you can at it. Especially with the 3"-4.25" sizes...you can just pop that thing in place, you can really kind of teeter-totter it right above the fish's head and wait for it to react, then maybe let it coast down past 'em to the bottom."
Might be a walleye bait but IF the hook is right, definitely could be a bassin' bait too...or maybe Berkley has a bass-specific version coming? Just speculatin'....
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Is this the new Rapala jerkbait? 👀
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Talkin' the one Jacob Wheeler and Patrick Walters were fishing at Redcrest and the Classic, and which Al Lindner mentioned recently, rumored to be heavily pro influenced and to be announced at ICAST:
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Both of those screencaps are from the new VMC RedLine Hooks vid on YT. Gotta shout out bass-head Matt A for the eagle eye on this'n, thanks man!
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Few Top 10 bait breakdowns
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Damiki rig = 50%
Swimbait = 20%
Shakey head = 20%
Crankbait = 20%
10% each = Finesse jig, Lipless crank (Storm Arashi Vibe), Dropshot
Okeechobee, FL 'Yota
Won by FL's Jessie Mizell with 51-15, who mostly fished a SPRO Bronzeye Poppin Frog 70 (killer gill) MODDED by adding flashabou (like mylar) to the legs – which "shimmered and fanned out" on the surface:
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Smith Lake, AL 'Yota
Won by Jordan "I'm not Jesse – or am I?" Wiggins doing what Jesse would have done, fishing a shakey head:
> On day 1 Wiggins concentrated on fish in ditches and drains that were staging.... But when conditions changed...on day 2, he began targeting spawning spotted bass on isolated chunk rock....
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1. Keith Poche is DQd from the Murray Elite.
Because he's fishing the Bass Pro Tour event there. Was announced officially by B.A.S.S. but everyone knew already....
2. Little more on Mike Iaconelli going in the Hall of Fame.
^ Post talks about it but quick 2c from me which I've said before: Everyone able to "be themselves" as pros or even below the pro tournament level – meaning their own style, not "you have to act and dress this way to be a pro" – is because of Mike.
His Classic-win shouting, which cost him at the time, later helped him and everyone else. Was bass fishing bad before? Nope. Was it better afterward? Maybe – I definitely like to see everyone's personalities come out more, and that started happening before social media.
Does Mike deserve credit for pushing bassin' into a new era, really by just being himself? I believe so. Seems like that's what Jersey guys do...😁
Congrats to him again!
3. How Tyler Rivet rigs his Sucka Punch bait.
Has a slit in the side so the hook is pretty much "gone," letting the bait punch through easier. Gotta think it'd be a decent skipping bait too:
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Check the Sucka Punch on TW.
4. Watch Elitist Cole Sands and Mike Surman crank deep fast.
In that YT vid they're cranking the Hardcore 5+ (mostly, below) and Hardcore 7+, and reelin' 'em as fast as they can. The 5+ gets to 16-20' and they say they like 'em because:
- Weight transfer = longer cast = runs deeper longer
- The big lip allows it to deflect off cover better
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5. Is Kevin Short transitioning back into K Pink?
He's bustin' chops on social again and now this, from the Dardanelle 'Yota:
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🤔
6. BFL happenin's.
Arkansas River, AR: MO's Brett Govreau cast a spinnerbait where laydowns met the bank and caught 'em in 8-12" of water.
Dale Holler, TN: KY's Lee Sinclair fished a Damiki Vault blade bait in 30' and weighed largies.
Another BFL there was won by TN's Isaac Peavyhouse with a Damiki Rig with 1/2-oz Damiki Rig Jigheads in 30-50' using Lowrance ActiveTarget sonar.
Pickwick: TN's Trent Suratt won his THIRD Pickwick BFL since 2019. Fished spawning smallmouths with a Zoom Trick Worm (gp) on a 3/16-oz Johnston Lures shakey head. Chink rock in 4-6'.
Hartwell, GA: GA's Max Heaton fished a shakey head on points targeting bass with Garmin LiveScope.
Lake Mitchell, AL: AL's Brent Reaves won it fishing for spotted bass on seawalls behind folks, dragging a shakey head with a YUM Dinger.
7. NY HSer signs with TN's Carson-Newman.
Congrats! I just run the commits I come across....
8. Would you fish this color?
I would! G-man's Buckeye Ballin' Out Jig in what was a Classic-only color called "dark mode:"
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9. Check BioSpawn's incoming different swim worm.
Interesting – definitely different. Called the ExoKick:
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11. Why the Vexus AVX boats "just say no" to plastic.
Interesting little IG vid, 1 reason of many I love my boat! 😍
12. FishLab Hydra Glide bait is now on TW.
Believe this is Bill Siemantel-designed, 8" and $24.99:
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13. Pure Fishing has a new CEO.
Harlan Kent was the CEO for the last 4 years – don't think I've ever met him, but gotta say he and his team have done a stellar job. Think of all the great stuff Berkley, Abu, etc have come out with. Wow.
> Effective immediately, Kent will move into a new role as a member of the company's board of directors and an advisor on a number of special projects.
New guy with big shoes to fill is named Dave Allen:
> Allen has more than 30 years of relevant leadership experience, including over a decade in the outdoor recreation space. He was most recently president and CEO of Igloo.... Prior to that, Allen was the group president at Vista Outdoor with responsibility for more than 35 brands and president of Coleman.
Vista owns Simms and a bunch of hunting brands among other stuff.
14. Rapala VMC has a new CEO too.
> ...Lars Ollberg as the new president and CEO of Rapala VMC Corp. He will start...May 1st.... Lars Ollberg was until June 2022 COO and global management team member of Rapala VMC.
Also Cyrille Viellard is the new deputy CEO, and Jean-Philippe Nicolle is the new CFO.
15. Andrew Cullen new Yamaha director of marine connectivity.
> In his new role, Cullen is responsible for all facets of creating and supporting the Connected Boat experience to dealers, consumers and OEMs.
> Cullen joined Yamaha in 2006 and led digital marketing and communications for Yamaha's Watercraft Group....
16. MN: Rainy River ramp wait times can be 4 hours??
Not bassin' but dang!
> During the busiest times (i.e. weekends), it's not uncommon for anglers to wait up to 4 hours in line to launch their boats. And it's a double ramp, meaning 2 drivers can launch boats simultaneously.
Can't link it, it's at: grandviewoutdoors com
17. KS: New 4.07-lb state record crappie.
Didn't see anything about whether he was using forward-facing sonar.
18. MN: 30 Asian carp netted out of Pool 6.
> While invasive carp have been previously captured in Pool 6 and upstream as far as the Twin Cities metro, this is the largest number captured at one time this far upstream.
Word is the fish said they were trying to get up to Gussy's for an autograph...😆
Headline of the Day
This Strange Species Invading the Everglades May Be More Destructive Than Pythons
The Asian swamp eel. Hey gov'ts, stop allowin' importin' critters!
Classic Updatin's
1. Gussy weighed all smallies to win a Classic, someone said that Kevin VanDam (Pittsburgh) and Woo Davis (Chicago) also did. Can anyone say one way or another? NOT just about the last day, the whole 3 days. My recollection is that both KVD and Woo weighed at least one largie as well...?
2. Carl Jocumsen actually was not the first Aussie to fish a Classic. Kim Bain-Moore fished it in 2009 through being the AOY in the short-lived Women's Bassmaster Tour. Good catch from bass-head Dennis F.
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Kevin VanDam: Ignore the spawn?
He didn't say that but kinda sorta because:
> Pre-spawn and post-spawn patterns that surround the spawn are more stable and consistent over time than trying to catch that sudden move to the bank in a single pocket or cove. Also, these patterns are usually more repeatable over large sections of the lake, providing more real estate to work with.
> Typically the shallower upper ends of lakes warm up fastest, and the deeper, clearer lower ends are slower to warm. With that, the spawn in the upper end of a lake can be as much as a month ahead of the lower end.
> If they are spawning at the dam, chances are there are some great post-spawn pattern options far up the lake. Conversely, if fish are making beds up the lake, chances are there are fish far down the lake that are still a few weeks away from spawning.
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"I passed up a wad of bass because I was too stubborn to try something different."
- Bobby Lane talkin'. BOBBY LANE! B-Lane thank you for making me feel less dumb and stubburn (even though I am)! 🤣 More:
> I've learned that I need to be a lot more versatile in practice. Not just in my fishing but in my tackle prep too. I always need to carry things like Berkley Dredger crankbaits and dropshot rigs.
> I also need to spend more time looking with my electronics. I should have fired up ActiveTarget on my Lowrance and tried to find fish with it. I'm getting better at it the more I do it.
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This pic makes me wanna fish a jig so bad! Believe that's a Jewel Finesse Jig in PB&J? The rod is one of the Virtus/Jewel Accura series that helps support the Autism Society.
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Jay Kumar's BassBlaster is a daily-ish roundup of the best (sometimes worst) and funniest stuff in bassin', hand-picked by me – Jay Kumar. I started BassFan.com, co-hosted Loudmouth Bass with Zona, was a B.A.S.S. senior writer and a bunch more in bassin'. The Blaster is the #2 daily read on any given day in the wide world o' bass so thanks for readin'!
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