Palaniuk ran 60 miles to Lake Huron first, where he finally caught a 5-pounder around 9 o’clock on his first bite of the morning, then added a 4 before running 80 miles back to the south end of Lake St. Clair.
“I caught two 4s and a 3 in 30 minutes on the first place I stopped at St. Clair,” Palaniuk said.
That’s how quick it can happen here, if you can keep your wits about you. Nobody pushes it to the final minute like Palaniuk does. It’s not possible. He stopped near the check-in point yesterday with a few minutes left and landed a late fish that looked like it might help him. So he put his smallest fish on a balance beam with the one he’d just caught. His check-in time was 4 p.m.
“I was balance-beaming at 3:59,” Palaniuk said. “I put (the boat) on pad at 3:59.32 and made it back by 4 o’clock. It probably gave me another quarter-pound. At the end of the year, it could be a difference-maker. That’s why I push it. I’ve won more tournaments on my last cast than I have my first cast.”
Palaniuk has only one 3-pound, 12-ounce bass at 12:30, according to BASSTrakk, and has dropped down to 47th place in the standings. It looks like he’s going to need some more late heroics today.
“I feel like these smallmouth are on a NASCAR racetrack,” Palaniuk said. “They only turn left, and they’re just making a big circle. You’ve got to run into them when they’re slowing down in a turn.”