With only a month separating the Bassmaster Classic and the first Elite Series tournament of the season on the Sabine River, it’s really amazing how different my mindset was for those two events.
I would have been crushed if I had finished 44th in the Classic, because nothing but a win was going to satisfy me. But finishing 44th on the Sabine River was fine with me, because it meant I had survived.
That was the name of the game down there – for me, at least.
While the Classic is a one-shot, swing-for-the-fences kind of deal, the Elite Series is a long and winding road where a bad start can pretty much ruin your whole season. And since the Sabine is a good place to have a bad start, I went looking, first and foremost, for a place that would help me bring in a limit on Day 1.
Even that was easier said than done.
On a fishery as big as the Sabine, you would think everybody would be spread out. But when you find the keeper fish, it seems like there’s always just a little small group with several anglers competing for them.
I found a little ditch that was real narrow and about a quarter-mile long with quite a few spawning fish, and I managed to catch a limit there the first day of the tournament that weighed 10 pounds, 4 ounces. But there were two other boats in there with me, and that meant 15 fish were caught from a small spot that wasn’t going to replenish itself.
Fortunately, I had already gotten what I needed from it.
While that 10-4 probably won’t mean much next month on Guntersville, it put me in 18th place after one day on the Sabine. Then with only one keeper bite on Friday – a Sabine giant that weighed 3-12 – I made the Top 53 Saturday cut in 38th place with 14-0 and guaranteed myself a check.
Most importantly, after catching one more fish on Saturday for a final total of 16-12, I avoided a bad start in the Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year race.
If you mess up the first tournament of the year, it can make for a miserable season because you’re scratching and clawing the rest of the way. Some people even say, if you finish below a certain spot in the first tournament, Angler of the Year is out of the question.
I guess that’s why I chose to play it a little safe with such a tough tournament up first on the schedule.
I didn’t run very far because I wanted to fish places where I could take all factors out of the game.
There are a lot of places accessible off the Sabine River over in Louisiana that might look really good on Google Earth. But you can spend a lot of time trying to find them, risk tearing your equipment up, and when you get there, they’ll be posted as private property.
Even worse, you might find some fish in an area like that during practice without seeing a “posted” sign. Then when you come back during the tournament, someone might come out and ask you to leave.
I just didn’t want to take that kind of chance with the start of my season, and I left feeling pretty good about a 44th-place finish.
Hopefully, there will be better moments down the road.
Some tournaments will definitely be about winning.
This one was about living to fish another day.