Chris Zaldain in a big fish flurry
Chris Zaldain had a big fish flurry late in the day yesterday. We’ve been waiting on that for quite some time.
The last 20 minutes he’s been in a flurry. Catching a fish on virtually every cast. But none have been much over 2 pounds.
The sun continues to get brighter and Zaldain keeps plugging but the clock continues to chip away as well.
He has less than 45 minutes of fishing.
Check in is 5 pm. And it will take 1 hour, 15 minutes to get back. It could take longer with the increased boat traffic.
The thing is it takes so long to catch these fish. Several minutes for any fish that can help him.
I keep remembering the Elite on Guntersville when Zaldain has a late flurry and was probably 5 extra minutes from having enough time to win there.
Kennedy the tinkerer
Steve Kennedy is a lure tinkerer by trade, sort of. The Alabama pro channels his professional engineering background into modifying lures. Sometimes even without the hooks. Here’s what he told me this morning when interviewed for the top lures gallery.
The glide bait failed to produce fish early on during the tournament. Not to be outdone, Kennedy engineered a workaround while retaining the high potential of his area to produce during the week.
Canterbury vs. Frazier

Combs thinks big
Decision time
The day is progressively getting brighter which is a good thing for all the anglers.
Smallmouth seem to love the sun and when it’s brighter they seem to pull up shallower. The more sun they get the more fuel they have and more they want to burn.
The last few hours of today should be really interesting if this trend continues.
Looking at BassTrakk no one seems to be distancing themselves from the pack. The door is open for virtually everyone.
Two bites from Zaldain like those from the previous three days and he’s in the lead. That goes for Chris Johnston as well.
The thing we are seeing is that as the day wears on we are starting to see those big black bodies swimming in shallower water.
The more sun they get the blacker they get.
From this point on it will boil down to who makes the right decisions and how well the execution for each plays out.