How Michael Neal won the St Lawrence MLF BPT

Michael “Top 10” Neal is still “Top 10” Neal but this time he finished in the top spot! So in a way I guess it wasn’t a surprise, but getting that close so many times I bet it was a bit of a relief for him. Here’s how he won his 2nd red trophy.

Going in and practice

> “The area I fished is down around Clayton – it’s the only area of the river I’m familiar with. I was fighting with myself whether to go down there because I thought it would be won in an area of the iriver where it’s long and narrower, and not fishing specific places [so drifting].

> “But [from] practice I knew I could have a really good tournament down there for sure. Every time I would stop, I would get a bite. If it topped out from 40′ to 55′ deep on top, I was guaranteed to get a bite.

> “That was a lot deeper than normal. When I went down there before, I fished more like 30-40′ deep. I think that made a difference – fishing for fish that were not as pressured….

> “I saw some guys every day, including the Knockout Round, but nobody really stayed in that area….”

Tournament

> “The first morning in practice I’d found some shallow fish so I tried to mix that in. I started in those shallow places and fished 2-3 of them, but didn’t get a bite. That’s not my game anyways. When you’re fishing this format, if you’re not fishing your game, you’re not gonna win. You can still have a good tournament, but you’re not gonna win.

> “I went to my deeper stuff, and pretty much started getting bit immediately. I had 60-something lbs and was in 6th place.

> “In practice, if I caught 2 I’d put a waypoint on it and didn’t even drop back down again. When I went to to one of those places, I got bit really often and 6-8 would come up with it. [Day 2] I was getting a pretty good lead and was getting pretty close to safe [to make the Knockout Round even with no more fish], so I pulled off that area totally.

> “Day 2 was when all the rain was…picked the trolling motor up an hour early and went to the ramp, to stop having to fight the rain anymore.

> “Day 3 I fished exactly the same – 40-60′, I didn’t do anything different. But I was starting to lear that once you leaned on an area ad caught 4-5, it probably was not worth going back to. Once you pulled them out of that current break a few times, they didn’t even go back to it. …you wouldn’t see any [on the screen].

> “The Knockout Round went really well. Everywhere I stopped I was pretty much getting bit consistently. A stretch I found on day 2, I did one drift down and knew I was safe. So I had almost 2 hours to play with, or practice.

> “I actually went to another area that was about 15 miles by boat but just a handful of miles as the crow flies, to stuff I found in practice and just marked. Every time my bait hit the bottom, I caught one.

> “So then I changed my mind to where I was going to start the final day…go back to where I ended the Knockout Round. It had the same exact setup – same depth, same everything.”

When he got there it was on, and that was all she wrote.

How and what he fished

> “Pretty much everything [on the bottom] in the area I was in was rock. You wanted either bigger rock than everything else, like bouldery-type rock, or a seam.

> “My best place was what I would call ‘rolling shoals’ – constantly up/down up/down…a lot of leading edges and tailing edges for a current break A lot of people don’t realize that in front of those places is a current break, as well as behind.

> “I was drifting for the most part. [The first 2 days] if I caught one, I’d hit anchor on the Power-Pole Move and make a few more casts and catch a couple more. Then I’d resume drifting again. The last 2 days I had no choice but to drift because the current and wind were so strong.”

Baits

He only fished a dropshot:

> Big Bite Baits Scentsation Quarantine Craw (gp purple copper) cut down and modified with 8 skirt strands he inserted with a needle. Because “I had a lot of fish come up and just bite the bait and not get it, and follow it up and never commit. I got tired of hearing about all the fuzzy dice stuff so I decided to make my own and it worked.

> “I just tried to mimic the pictures I’ve seen of [those types of baits] online – I put 8 strands in it, spaced [like the pictures of other baits]. The skirt material was all gp or had 1 strand of orange in it. I wasn’t real sure what they thought that was mimicking, but a few I caught in practice…crayfish pinchers had orange on it….

> “[Once he made that change] at least 50% of the fish that started chasing the bait again would bite. I don’t know if it’s something they don’t see, or something about that skirt material that’s like poking a finger in their chest and eventually they do something about it….”

> 1/0 Gamakatsu G-Finesse Stinger Drop Shot Hook, 1/2-oz Denali Kovert Tungsten Weight, 10-lb Sunline Overwatch Braid to 7-lb Sunline Shooter fluoro, 7’ 6” M Denali Kovert Spin Rod.

> “I just dropped it and held onto it til something started pulling back. No action on it or anything else.”

Electronics

> “LiveScope was not a huge deal. I was just making sure I was on the right drift or line…lining up your casts. You could do the exact same thing with Humminbird 360 or anything like that.”

Shoutouts

> “The line. I was throwing 7-lb line and that’s really light, especially fishing around those bigger rocks and things. Most guys throw 10….. I never broke a single fish off all week. That line I have a lot of confidence in, and it performed absolutely flawlessly.”