Practice day for the Classic is always a little unusual for those of us covering it on the water.
Most of the guys are fairly laid back. Few of them are wearing jerseys, which creates an odd photo at times.
Few of them actually want to catch anything. I just rolled up on Austin Felix as he worked his way down a stretch of flooded bushes. Always amicable, his first question was “what are you guys doing today?”
Our response was “ waiting for you to catch one then moving on.”
He just laughed. “You are going to be waiting a long time. I don’t have a bait tied on with a hook on it.”
He did add that he has “shook off” four or five bites. In fishing vernacular, that means he had the bite but by shaking the bait from the fish’s mouth he doesn’t put a hook in him. The hope is the fish will still be there on Friday.
There’s a lot of that going on today for certain. But there will be some who will need to lay into a few bites just to know what is there.