Mark Menendez appears to be undergoing a reboot of his 28-year career. It started with a third-place showing on the St. Johns River, then a sixth-place last week at Lake Hartwell. BASSTrakk shows him in third place right now. For starters, he chose not to make the run to the Cooper River. Coincidentally, he finished 12th here in 2016. So far so good on another run at Championship Sunday this week.
This morning while shooting BASSCam videos I came up on Menendez. On his front deck amid the pile of rods was a push pole that stretched to the rear live wells. Old school? You bet. Today’s stealthy, silent and powerful trolling motors, armed with weed-chewing props, are the choice for super-shallow angling. Add to that weapon a shallow water anchor system and there is little need for the old school pole.
Then I discovered that Menendez is not using just one, but three push poles.
“You can never have enough and I borrowed two of them,” he explained. “There is a push pole for every job.”
Menendez should know. His last victory came in 2009 on the Arkansas River, where he jumped logs and stumps in an aluminum boat to go where no other boat could. A push pole enabled him to make the final push into his winning area. He’s not fishing from an aluminum rig this week, but a Skeeter FX20. Still, there is a logic behind using the push pole.
“I want to go where no other boat can go.” Hmm. Sounds familiar. And you can bet that tied on to one of his casting rigs is another old school weapon. Menendez favors a Strike King Premier spinnerbait in his favorite throwback skirt color. It is cantaloupe in color and he got the idea from 1970s-era pro Elroy Kreuger. He gave it credit for both top 12s fished thus far in the current season.
So bring on the old school, Mark. Whatever works is a good thing to get back into a fourth Championship Sunday.