At the end of the 2025 Bassmaster Elite Series season, I was two spots away from not requalifying. Of course, I’m thankful I made it back for 2026, but I know I still have some things to work on.
When I look back over this year’s season, the word that comes to mind is “disappointment.” I definitely want to continue to fish the Elites, but I’ve been trying to figure out what I’m doing wrong. Or what I’m not doing?
I know I can compete with these guys, so I’m not doubting my abilities. But I don’t want to be in that position again of worrying about squeaking in.
There are so many young anglers coming into the sport who really want this, so I’m going to have to work my butt off. Rather than dwell on the negative feelings of a bad year, I’m using this as a positive.
I have plans to do something next year I’ve never done. I plan on pre-practicing as much as possible.
I used to do that before my Elite career, but I never felt like that really helped me. When I had that great 2023 season, I didn’t pre-practice much. I just wanted it. I wanted to show people I belong here.
Maybe I lost some of that drive to prove myself. But I’m not going to sit here and regret anything. If, after next year, I don’t requalify for the Elites, I don’t want to look back and ask why I didn’t just put in more time and effort.
I will say that 2024 was a weird year for me and that may have something to do with why I had such a bad season. During my 2023 rookie season, I had a lot of consistency off the water because I still had Larry Nixon as my travel partner.
After 2023, Larry retired and I didn’t know what I was going to do on the travel side. I had some good roommates last year, but it’s hard to describe how valuable it is to have someone you’ve known a long time to talk to.
For the 2025 season, Chad Pipkens and I got together as travel partners and our families got to spend time together. That ended up becoming a very good situation for both of us.
I think things got going in the right direction, and it showed in the fact I made more check cuts this year and finished higher in the points. But since Chad didn’t requalify for 2026, I’m considering what I’m going to do next year.
I can tell you one thing I will not do next season is ever assume I know what to expect from any fishery.
For example, in the final Elite event at the Mississippi River, I didn’t do well. I had fished several events there over the years, so I was thinking I know this place, I know how it fishes.
But a lot of these places change over the years. You can’t just go off of history, even from a year before. That’s why I think doing more pre-practice for 2026 will help me.
Like I said, the 2025 season gave me a lot of negatives, but I’m going to do my best to use that as mental motivation to invest more into next season.
