BassBlaster

Winning baits and deets, KVD fishing secrets, Win a K2 cooler!

 

 

 

 

 

 


Today’s Top 5

Edwin Evers’ winning baits…

 

 

 

…at the BASSFestivusSpectaularis on Kentucky Lake. Bassin’Fan has some good pattern info (c’mon B.A.S.S.!), but I talked to E-squared to get more deets:

Days 1-2

Fished shallow, key was areas with drops, key bait was a 5″ Megabass Spark Shad (albino, drew a chartreuse line down the sides) on 1/2- to 1-oz heads.

Days 3-4

Water cleared up and lost a lot of flow, fished drops (in 10-15′) with four baits in one specific order and the key was firing up the fish with a crankbait. “You had to get the school fired up first with that crankbait,” he told me. “All the other stuff was real subtle.”

Order was:
> Crankbait: Megabass Deep-Six (sexy French pearl)
> Swimbait: Spark Shad again
> Hair jig: homemade 1/2-oz bucktail (white)
> Big shaky: Zoom Magnum Trick Worm (red bug), 3/4-oz Swampers Head Turner shaky head

Why that order of baits? “I could get the most amount of bites in that order,” he said. He also noted he caught the hair jig fish fairly high off the bottom.

Other stuff

Warning: Now’s the time for anyone without a sense of humor to hang up.

> That “sexy French pearl” color is also known as “ooh-la-la” — and if you have a buddy who calls Tackle Warehouse and orders it by that color, please do your utmost to get that on camera and send it to me….

> Evers wolfed down lots of his fave flavor Evers Pecans in the boat. That flavor is jalapeno, and I gotta believe that powder on his fingers kept those basses choking his baits. For sure that’s how he got the biggun….

> Last but not least, he said “fishing goofy” was super-important. Doesn’t mean casting lefty, means this:


Evers doesn’t sweat.

 

 

 

Lookin’ at Steamin’ Stevie (no, JO, I got the leader) Bowman’s photo gallery of Edwin, was hit with a sudden insight: Evers always looks perfect. No sweat, no scruff, no redness. In fact, thinking back on all the weigh-ins I’ve been at, the guy never did look worn out or messed up.

Don’t know how that happens…?

Check this pic: Sun’s high, he’s been fishing all day FOR THE WIN!, and he looks like he just showered and got dressed. #helloladies

KVD: What does the X really stand for?

 

 

 

 

Kevin VanDam fished 4 different Strike King XD crankbaits and a hair jig to finish 2nd at the ‘Fest, at a lake where he’s still hasn’t finished below 3rd. #stout

Not surprised — and cool to see — KVD up at the top again. Also not surprised that the XDs tore it up at Kentucky Lake, one of Strike King’s proving grounds. But wondering if the “X” in XD does NOT in fact really stand for “Xtra” as in “Xtra Deep,” but instead is some sort of secret deal going back to the founding of this country, like the Freemason’s hooked X:

Either that or I need to cut down on my TV….

Crankbaits Kevin used:

> Strike King 6XD (normal and silent), 8XD and 10XD…natural color patterns like sexy blueback herring and green gizzard shad worked best….

> On the the silent version: “I don’t know that they’re conditioned to the one with the rattles on this lake, but it seems like that. Using the silent one was just night and day. Once you quit catching them on the regular one, you could switch to the silent one and start catching them again.”

Incidentally, KY guy named Mark Pierce won the Barren River BFL this weekend throwing the silent 6XD (sexy shad). Said: “I’m a firm believer that silent baits perform the best on this lake when the fish are postspawn.”

Get ’em here on TackleWarehouse.com.

[No link to that BFL story because whoever redesigned the FLW website apparently forgot about one key thing: users!]

KVD fishing secret: The clamp.

 

 

 

One thing you gotta master — with some Karate Kid-like training — to fish like KVD is this. Look at that clamp he’s got on the fish!
A dang eel slathered in Vaseline couldn’t get outta that grip mang!

I made a lot of guys look pretty stupid this week.

 

 

 

Brett Hite sorta braggin’ about having something different that was working on KY Lake. Cool, but had some more strong words after that:

> “You’ve got to keep those baits down and your casts low, because with these guys, you don’t want to feed them anything like that.”

> “Next thing you know, you’re fishing the same spot with them and they have the same secret weapon.”

Wow! Prince heard that and was like:

 

News

 

1. Who held this tournament?

Zippo BASSfest at Kentucky Lake presented by A.R.E. Truck Caps

If you were a non-fisherman, would you know? How ’bout this:

Carhartt College Wild Card presented by Bass Pro Shops

Don’t know where that’s going but stuck out to me.

2. J-Lu’s bro in golf US Open.

His bro’s name: K-Lu. Name and pic are suspiciously similar…. #twinning

3. Rapala Take a Kid Fishin’ photo contest.

4. New Shimano Zodias rods.

I’ve fished ’em, very nice, look cool too:

> …six casting models in 6’10” and 7’2″ lengths, and six spinning models in 6’8″ and 7′ lengths.

> “With the Zodias rods, we can provide anglers with one rod designed to perform as needed with all types of lures – be it worms, jigs, deep-diving or lipless crankbaits, spinnerbaits and jerkbaits,” said Robby Gant with Shimano’s rod development team.

> All the Zodias rod blanks feature Hi-Power X construction, eliminating blank twist for both better casting distance and accuracy. Hi-Power X is a unique process to support the lightweight blanks, with carbon tape added in a 45-dgreee ‘X’ pattern on the outside of the blank.

5. TX boat sales improving…

…with rising water. Good to hear.

6. MD DNR leaders shown the door.

SSDD politics. Part that cracks me up is that the new political dude doing the firing said:

> “…won’t go into a long list of their respective achievements; what they’ve accomplished is significant and you are familiar with their efforts.”

Okay NOW it makes sense to fire them….

7. PA: Man finds syringes in Beaver River.

Those beavers are trying to hook those smallies man!

 

Must Reads

1. db’s read of Jerry McKinnis’ book.Very cool. don barone’s pieces are rare windows into bass fishing, and that is one heck of a rare window into Jerry. Can’t wait to read the book.

One Jerry story for you: While back I had an idea called BassFan.com, and one of the first people I brought it to was Jerry (with Stevie Bowman). Jerry liked the BassFan idea but had to pass on it at the time because he was about to jump ship from FLW to B.A.S.S. because ESPN was buying B.A.S.S. He was in a tough spot and really wrestled with the decision. That’s how I remember it, anyway.

A lot more stories, but that one came to mind.

2. KVD on college and HS fishing.

Totally agree it’s a big deal.

Win ya a K2 cooler dads!

K2 Coolers and me are celebrating dads the whole friggin’ month! Giving away 1 high-end, high-dolla K2 cooler a week like one o’ these-here:

How do you win? 2 ways:

1. Post a pic of you and your kids fishin’ to the BassBlaster AND K2 Coolers Facebook pages.

OR

2. Send me a cool sticker (nothing worse than rated PG) for my cue-bald white K2 cooler, because a cooler without cool stickers ain’t cool. Mailin’ addy:

Jay Kumar
Sasq Media
PO Box 133

Lebanon, NJ 08833

Git on it yo, and good luck! (U.S. residents only, sorry!)

Tip of the Day

 

 

God article by BB on Bassmaster.com on Brett Hite’s western/Japanese rig from this weekend’s Elite, where he finished 3rd:

> “I caught pretty much all my fish on a Yamamoto 7.75 Kut Tail in plum color. I was using 16-pound braid…with 8-lb Sunline Fluorocarbon line as my leader.”

> “I was wacky rigging this thing with an O-ring on it and a [Reins] nail weight in the head. I would just kind of cast it out there, let it go to the bottom and drag it along and shake it. It’s just something they haven’t seen.”

> …Aaron Martens’ new 1/0 dropshot-style hook that’s kind of a circle-style hook.”

> “With a 7-foot spinning rod, you can cast that [rig] so far. That 7.75 Kut Tail is like a giant Senko that tapers down and has a cut-off tail.”

> “You can cast it a long way, so you want a heavy-medium or medium-action rod. When they bite it on long casts, you want to be able to still get that hook in them.”

> On a standard wacky rig, it’s easy to sling worms off a hook during a cast and just as easy to lose them when a hooked fish breaks water and starts shaking its head. Placing the hook through the O-ring…”The O-ring saves a lot of money.”

Quote of the Day

 

I wasn’t going to win on a spinning rod.

 

– Hahahaha! That’s Eddie Evers talkin‘, after pickin’ up a spinnin’ rod for a couple casts in the Bassin’Festivus derby. Fo sho good decision — because would David Fritts ever be caught dead with a wimp stick??

Rest my case…lol.

Shot of the Day

 

If this isn’t some kind of photographic illusion, this never ceases to frickin’ amaze me — spectators fishing. I know it’s a public lake, but dang:

Random Cool

 

Big-time diggin’ this tune, Electric Man by Rival Sons. Finally some new music that ROCKS — about dang time!

Great rods/reels mang!

Awesome line!

Killah baits yo!

Rad info dude!

Gotta have it!

Jay Kumar is the guy who created BassFan, co-hosted Loudmouth Bass with Zona, was a B.A.S.S. senior writer and a whole lot more in bassin’. His BassBlaster is a daily-ish roundup of the best in bassin’, and is the #2 or #3 daily read on any given day in the wide world o’ bass. Also available as an app:

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