I had a great time this past weekend. It's a GREAT event with GREAT people and GREAT sponsors!

I had a pretty simple plan for this tournament. I figured most people would be fishing the Keys and I never have done well there. So I knew I was going to fish outside and I wanted to target clear areas with structure that i could sight fish.

Day1: I blasted off making my way towards Rattlesnake, but decided to go straight across towards the tullies. The sun wasn't up enough where I could see what was below me. So I pitched a jig into the tullies. After about 5 casts my line started moving away from the tullies. I set the hook and missed it. I continued to make a few more casts but no luck. I decided to make my way around the bend and work another tullie line. I threw a drop shot texas rigged and got hit after a few cast. Fish jumped and spit the hook. I finally got to the area I wanted to fish. The sun was up and it was clear enough to see the bottom (8-10ft). As I was looking around I saw few cruisers and managed to hook up only to loose them as well. I was getting pretty frustrated at this point. I decided to have the hook exposed to see if that would change things. I saw a fish sitting on top of a big rock. After a few casts I'm hooked up and got it in the net! I fished with an exposed hook the rest of the day. A lot of the fish I caught bit multiple times before getting a hook set. On some occasions the fish seemed to lose interest. I would then switch to a jig and that seemed to work. I was able to cull 2 fish that day.

Day 2: I did the same thing as day 1 but the visibility wasn't as good and the wind picked up earlier. Made me a little nervous since sight fishing was what I was confident in doing. I managed to get a limit by about 10am. Not a great limit. I had 2 barely keepers that I needed to upgrade. After the wind picked up to the point where I could see bottom, I decided to work my way back to an area that didn't have as much wind. I threw a senko under a tree and Bamm! My biggest fish for the day! I finally made back to where I started on day 1 and I managed to see a fish hanging out on a tullie edge. With the wind blowing pretty good, I tossed a jig at it. It bit 2 times before I was able to set the hook successfully. Another good one. After that one, I knew I had a pretty good limit.

Colors didn't seem to matter for me. It just took time and patience.

This was also a personal best for me as I have never brought in a 20 pound limit in a tournament before and I was able to do that on both days.

Looking forward to the next one!

Robert