Jason Christie has mentioned several times this morning “going back to check my frog fish.” Based on what Chris Johnston is doing, Christie might want to check them now. Johnston, fishing in a field of lily pads, landed a 4 1/2-pounder at 10:55 a.m. It jumped him from outside the top 10 into 3rd place on BassTrakk. He’s got every bit of 13-8 on the day, as that 4-8 appeared to be closer to 5-8. He caught it on a Spro Poppin’ Frog.
However, it was the one that got away on his next cast that had Johnston shaking his head, saying, “I just missed a giant.”
But Johnston wasn’t done. He added a 3-pounder 15 minutes later that moved him into 2nd placed.
“They’re chasing bluegills under those pads,” said Johnston, who came into this tournament ranked 6th in the Angler of the Year standings. “There’s a whole school under there. They were doing the same thing in practice.”
It’s going to be interesting to see how this late morning/early afternoon bite shakes out on Lake Guntersville. Some of the biggest bass of Day 1 were caught in the last three hours.