Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship

The highlight of the summer for me happened in late July.  My good friend John Peterson and I won the Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship, one of the premier, open team tournaments in North America.  This event takes place on Rainy Lake, which I feel is one of the BEST smallmouth fisheries in the World.  (www.canadianbass.com)

John and I had a great prefish for this tournament and opened the tournament strong, taking the early lead on day one with a five fish limit weighing 19.17 pounds. (pictured above)

The weather got nasty on day two with cold temperatures and high winds.  Fortunately we were able to put together a decent limit to hang around the top of the leaderboard heading into the final day.  After catching most of our fish on day one on topwater baits (Jackall SK Grande popper) we had to switch things up on day two, catching fish on tubes and spinnerbaits. 

The LakeMaster Woods/Rainy map card was very key in helping us find subtle sweetspots that held big smallmouths on Rainy Lake.  

The rough weather continued on day three but we were fortunate to get on a big school of smallmouths and put five of them in the boat.  We caught a really big bag on day three, weighing 20.35 pounds, which was enough to put us on top of the leaderboard at the end of the tournament.  

I have fished this tournament since 2000 and have several top five finishes so to finally win was pretty special.  This is a very tough tournament to win, with a competitive field.  Definitely one of the highlights of my fishing career so far!  John and I always have a great time fishing this event!   

Here is our plaque on the big trophy...
If you are interested in fishing the FFCBC next year, the event always takes place during the last weekend in July.  It's a top-notch tournament on one of the most beautiful lakes in the World.  I guarantee you'll have fun! www.canadianbass.com   

Bass tournaments

It's been a busy couple months fishing bass tournaments across the Sunset Country Region.  That's part of the reason I've been kinda slow on keeping up with my website.  We have a lot of fun fishing all of these great events, the only problem is our short summer goes by way to fast!  Our bass season is catch and release only through May and June, so there are no tournaments until July, then we have something going on nearly every weekend.  These are all community run events, with great fields and good payouts.  

The first tournament of the year was the Lake Despair Castin' For Cash event (www.lakedespairlodge.com), put on by Bill and Nell Godin at their resort.  August and I have won this tournament a couple of times and always have a good time fishing there.  We had a tougher than normal tournament this year, a combination of not finding a hot area with big fish and losing some good smallmouths.  We ended up with a 7th place finish in this 60 boat tournament.  The winners of this one were our buddies Jamie Bruce and Bryan Gustafson (pictured above).

Next up was the Shoal Lake Big Bass Classic, an annual event on one of our best bass fisheries in Sunset Country.  Chris Savage and I teamed up as usual but had probably our worst showing ever at this tournament.  We spent most of our time targeting largemoughs and just didn't get the right fish to bite.  We caught a mediocre 14 pounds per day to finish around 20th.  That's fishing. Ted and Louise Stewner won the tournament with 33 pounds of smallmouths.  Our good buddies Jay Samsal and Scott Dingwall took 2nd, thanks to a big day two, which included some big largemouths (pictured above).

The third weekend in July, August and I teamed up again for the Bronzeback Classic (www.bronzebackclassic.ca).  This was our second year fishing the tournament and for the second year in a row we ended up with a 5th place finish.  We had a great first day fishing around town, catching huge numbers of fish.  The second day we felt like we needed to try and catch a big bag to win the tournament and ran all over the lake trying to hunt down some big fish.  Unfortunately, things didn't work out and we ended up hitting the stuff we fished the first day for the last hour and a half of the day to catch our fish on day two.  We're looking forward to giving it another shot next year!  

The last weekend in July I fished the Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship with my good buddy John Peterson from Minnesota.  We had a great tournament and ended up in 1st place!  Look for a seperate entry about this event.  

The Kenora Bass International (www.kbifishing.com) took place the second weekend in August.  Chris Savage and I hooked up for this one again, a tournament that we have had a lot of success at over the years, including a couple of wins.  

We came out blazing the first day, catching the biggest bag of the tournament, at 19.78 pounds.  It was a mixed bag of three largemouths and two smallmouths and was one of our best days ever in this event.  

Here was a big cull we had the first day, changing a two pounder for a five pounder!  We like to see those!  

We held onto the lead through day two, but ran out of gas on day three, bringing in only 11 pounds to end up 9th.  It was a disappointing finish for sure based on our first two days.  That's fishing though.  I think it was a combination of us running out of fish, a lot of angler pressure in the area we were fishing and the fish simply just not biting.  

Late in August I teamed up with Scott Dingwall for the International Falls Bass Championship (www.ifallsbass.com), which puts anglers on the U.S. side of Rainy Lake for a day and on the Rainy River for a day.  We have had a lot of success at this tournament over the years and have won the tournament three times.  We had a good tournament, ending up with a 2nd place finish.  The photo above was a giant smallmouth I caught during my day of practice on lake.  It was the first fish I caught out there!  

There are a few more tournaments coming up later in September, so look for the reports on those down the line. 

Fishing, fishing, fishing...

Wow...sorry it's been so long since my last update.  Summer has been super busy for me, I've been fishing a lot obviously.  This is the first weekend I haven't fished a tournament since mid-June!  Over the past couple months, I have had a few good tournaments and plenty of fun days on the water.  Here are some photos from the past while...tournament stuff coming in a day or two.  

Here was a nice largemouth while prefising for the Shoal Lake Bass Classic back in July.  5 pounds.  

My good buddy Jarrod Sundmark with a nice smallmouth he caught while prefishing with me for the Bronzeback Classic in July.  

End of another beautiful day in Sunset Country!

Sean McAughey with a nice musky he caught while we were prefishing for the KBI.

Chris Savage with a nice pike while prefishing for the KBI - Lake of the Woods has everything!  

Jim Richardson and his son Colton with a nice walleye that Colton caught on a late July fishing trip.

On the same day, Colton also caught a nice pike! 

Chickamauga FLW Tour

The last FLW Tour event of the season took place at the end of June at Tennessee's Lake Chickamauga.  I had a pretty good tournament and ended up with a 26th place finish, which earned my over $10,000!  I was a little bit disappointed that I missed making the top 20 cut to fish on day three but I had to scrape and scrounge for what I got on day two, so it could have been worse!  

This was a big largemouth that I caught in practice...on a cool chatterbait/big fluke rig that is a hot local bait.  The fluke is a 7" Castiac bait.  Really nice, probably would work pretty good for early season musky at home in Sunset Country!  This fish was over 6 pounds and when I caught it, I had a whole school blow up on shad all around the boat.  

During the event I caught fish on a variety of stuff, including some deep ledges as well as some boat docks.  I caught the deep fish on a Jackall Muscle Deep 15 crankbait, a 3/4 oz football jig and I caught the dock fish on a drop-shot rig and a 1/2 oz Northland Jungle Jig.  

Here I am at the rules meeting with my good friend Blake Nick.  We became good buddies over the course of the season and had some fun fishing together.  

Launching the boat on day one of the tournament in the dark...we were taking off at first light during the tournament, though we did have a long fog delay on day two.  

Overall my experience fishing the FLW Tour this year has been great.  I had a lot of fun, made some new friends and learned a bunch.  I'm looking forward to giving it another shot again next year and hopefully I can improve my results.  

Huge thanks to my sponsors, especially KrugerFarms.com, International Comfort Products, Sunset Country Tourism and Lund Boat Company for making this dream a reality!  Many thanks to all of my other sponsors as well - Northland Fishing Tackle, Shimano, Power Pro, G. Loomis Fishing Rods, Jackall Lures, Frabill, Plano, Optima Batteries, Minn Kota, Humminbird, Skirts Plus and Spy Optics.  

Having fun at home

Summer is finally here in Sunset Country!  I'm home for a week right now before I head back down south for the final FLW Tour event of the season next week at Lake Chickamauga in Tennessee.  I love summer around Kenora and Lake of the Woods, so it's been a fun week at home.  I've been making the most of it and have been out fishing quite a bit.    

Here was a nice one that was released.  We were fishing shallow water, 4 - 10 feet, where there was a mix of weeds, sand and rock.  Caught them all on an 1/8 ounce Northland Vegas Jig tipped with a Jackall Clone Fry minnow in Threadfin Shad colour.  

Here is a close-up of the hot bait.  This is the most realistic, soft plastic minnow I have ever used.  They are relatively soft so one thing you want to do is get some instant glue to put on the jig collar so the plastic doesn't slide down on the jig.  

Also got out on Shoal Lake for a day with my buddy Scott Dingwall.  We caught over 100 bass, both smallmouths and largemouths, so that was fun!  Our fishing opportunities across the Sunset Country Region are so great!  

Our largemouths up here in the northern part of their range are so fat!  With the high water this year, the largemouth fishing should be pretty good all summer.