To help the competitors catch more and bigger fish in the 2015 Carhartt Bassmaster College Series National Championship presented by Bass Pro Shops, the Wisconsin Lowrance community used GoFree’s Insight Genesis lake-mapping service to create the most detailed map ever seen of the tournament venue, 4,649-acre Lake DuBay.
Insight Genesis helps anglers find fish fast by offering them free downloads of community-sourced contour charts from Insight Genesis Social Map, enabling them to create their own custom contour maps of un-mapped bodies of water, and helping them discover and dissect potential tournament-winning “sweet spots” that don’t show up on off-the-shelf marine maps. GoFree is the newest brand under the Navico umbrella, joining Lowrance, Simrad and B&G, to which Insight Genesis maps are exclusive.
“It says a lot about Lowrance’s commitment to college anglers and the Bassmaster College Series that they would devote time and resources to guarantee that our National Championship qualifiers get the best possible fishing map,” said Hank Weldon, Bassmaster College Series tournament manager. “With such a highly detailed Insight Genesis contour map, no matter where in the country our qualifiers are coming from, they’ll be able to fish Lake Du Bay with the confidence of a local.”
To create such a high-definition Insight Genesis map for the National Championship, GoFree and Lowrance hosted a mapping excursion on Lake DuBay in June. Each participant used the Lowrance unit on his boat to survey a pre-determined quadrant of the lake. The sonar data from each boat was then aggregated into a high-definition chart, complete with one-foot, blue-scaled depth contours — light blue indicates shallower water; dark blue, deeper water.
A wide spot in the Wisconsin River, Lake Dubay features visible cover like stumps, rip rap and aquatic vegetation, as well as submerged humps, saddles, points, sand bars and hard-bottom, rocky flats – just the kind of hidden fish-holding structure Insight Genesis excels at uncovering.
National Championship qualifiers who want to use the Insight Genesis Du Bay map in the tournament can download it for free from Insight Genesis Social Map at this link. An enhanced, more detailed map is available too – it includes a bottom-hardness layer and a vegetation-location layer. To get the enhanced map, email Navico’s Greg Huff at Greg.Huff@navico.com prior to Friday, July 3. Include your name, college, phone number and note which Lowrance unit you use on your boat. A digital file of the map will be emailed to you to save onto a blank SD card of any brand.
Bassmaster College Series qualifiers who do not have an Insight Genesis-capable sonar/GPS unit (Lowrance Elite, HDS Gen2 or HDS Gen3) can borrow a loaner unit from Lowrance. To apply, email Greg.Huff@navico.com prior to 5 p.m. CST on Friday, June 26. Include in your message your name, college and phone number.
The Insight Genesis bottom-hardness layer shows anglers the exact location, size and shape of fish-holding hard-bottom to soft-bottom transition areas – dark orange areas are the hardest bottom; a lighter orange indicates the next hardest bottom; tan is the next hardest bottom; and pale yellow shows the softest-bottom spots. The vegetation layer maps out exactly where the lake’s submerged vegetation is growing, making it easy to locate deep weedlines and grass on flats and humps.
“Insight Genesis allows you to really, truly see those sweet spots, within a sweet spot, within a sweet spot,” says 2009 Bassmaster Classic Champ Skeet Reese.
Not only do Insight Genesis maps show you where such areas are located – so you can speed directly to them, rather than slowly idling around searching for them – they also show your boat’s position on the map in relation to them, making it easy to make repeated, pinpoint casts to the strike zone.
With an Insight Genesis map, you’ll spend less time looking for fish, and more time catching them says Jacob Powroznik, who used one of Lake Hartwell to find fish in the 2015 Bassmaster Classic, in which he finished fifth.
“It was basically cheating, it’s so good,” Powroznik says of his Insight Genesis mapping. “You can ride around and see there’s a good drop right here, here’s where the deep water meets the bank, or is underneath docks. Check Insight Genesis out. I promise you, it will help you be a more successful fisherman.”
The Lake DuBay map – and many, many more – is available for free download not just for college anglers fishing in the National Championship, but also for anyone who opens a free Insight Genesis account. A free account provides access to thousands of free, high-definition contour maps of lakes close to home, across the country and around the world. Sign up for a free account here.