Yesterday Brock Mosley best exemplified what it takes to be successful in the Guaranteed Rate Bassmaster Elite at the Tennessee River. Mosley’s day was almost over, and he was one bass shy of a limit when he made a cast with a crankbait on a spinning rod in a place where he’d caught a big smallmouth the day before. The result was the big bass of the tournament so far – a 6-pound, 10-ounce largemouth bass. It produced almost half of Mosley’s 14-pound, 10-ounce bag that has him in third place today, 5-14 behind leader Jeff Gustafson.
“It seems like this (place) wakes up in a different mood every day,” Mosley said.
And it takes all day to figure it out. Even Gustafson, who had his tournament-leading 17-14 bag on Day 1 by 10 a.m., struggled to catch his fifth fish yesterday. Brandon Card closed the gap on Gustafson with the big bag of 16-10 Friday, but it took all day to do it.
“You can go for hours and not even get a sniff,” Card said. “Then you’ll catch two or three or four in a row. That’s what I did (Friday). I went from zero to five fish in like 20 minutes. To catch my seventh fish, it took hours.”
In Card’s five-bass limit, his fourth keeper came at 11:52 a.m.; he was able to cull for his fifth keeper at 4:22 p.m.
It’s going to be wet again today, but at least it won’t be as miserably cold as it was yesterday, when the high was only 47 degrees. Scott Martin, who moved up to 6th place with 13-7, said he was doing jumping jacks at times on the front deck of his boat to shake off the cold, and the Canadian Gustafson admitted he didn’t wear enough warm clothes yesterday. It’s already warmer (49 degrees) at today’s takeoff than it ever was Friday. The predicted high today is 64.
But that won’t change the long, slow grind it is during this true test of an angler’s skills. It begs the question: What mood will the Tennessee River waters including lakes Loudoun and Tellico be in today?