In his previous trips to Lake St. Clair, Tennessee’s Brandon Lester had not found the type of success he has this week at the AFTCO Bassmaster Elite Series at the famed fishery. Currently, Lester finds himself in 4th place with 45 pounds, 6 ounces with consecutive bags measuring over 22 pounds.
In his other three regular-season trips to the smallmouth factory, his best finish was a 24th in 2017.
What is the reason for his newfound success on St. Clair? Forward-facing sonar. Instead of aimlessly drifting across the vast flats, Lester can actually figure out where individual smallmouth are, eliminating the “hope” factor.
“I had never done real well here. This is the first tournament where I had Lowrance Active Target. That completely changed the game,” Lester said. “Before that, you would just go out in the middle and drift in the abyss. There is no rock out there or anything they are relating to. The fish are just moving and when they see something to eat, they eat it.”
To say forward-facing sonar has changed the sports would be an overstatement, but it rings particularly true at Lake St. Clair, where nearly every angler in the field is using it in almost the exact same fashion.
The Elite pros are spread out across vast flats (with Anchor Bay getting the most attention), each with their trolling motor on high waiting to see a smallmouth on their screen before even making a cast. The best is when the sun emerges, and the smallmouth hover 1 to 3 feet off the bottom.
“Everyone is doing the same thing, just cruising around looking at front-facing sonar. We are all doing the same thing,” Lester said. “I’m not making a cast if I don’t see one. That is what is making a little bit of a difference for me. Because I’ll see some guys making bomb casts and there is no need for doing that.
“I stand there with the bait in my hand until I see a fish on my graph.”
Cooper Gallant has employed a similar strategy and it has worked to the tune of 44-12 and a fifth-place showing after two days.
“I won’t make a cast unless I see them on my Garmin LiveScope for sure,” he said.
In the pre-event coverage, Bassmaster Opens Elite Qualifier pro Garrett Paquette said he believed this is the best forward-facing sonar lake in the country, and that has proven to be so this week.
St. Clair got better on Day 2
With abundant sunshine for a large portion of Friday, the catching on St. Clair somehow got better with 48 bags over 20 pounds hitting the scales. The highlights include Takumi Ito catching the VMC Monster Bag of the Tournament at 25-8, Joey Cifuentes III’s 24-0 showing, Luke Palmer’s 23-12 bag and then Skylar Hamilton rallying with 23-4 to punch his ticket to Day 3.
And those are just a couple of examples of stellar performances.
The Top 3 anglers from Day 1, Shane LeHew, Jason Christie and Bryan Schmitt, all fell outside the Top 10 after Day 2, though not very far. It goes to show that even the slightest slip-up can really hurt in this event, where weights are tight and the fishing is seemingly getting better.
Conditions proved to be the biggest factor in the phenomenal fishing day. Ito, for one, loved the calm sunny conditions while several other anglers mentioned a similar feeling.
“Calm, sunny, no wind, very good for me. I love it,” Ito said.
Gallant is in the area with the most fishing pressure on St. Clair and has been fortunate enough to catch one over 5 pounds every day thus far. He knows there are more bass there, but he isn’t sure if and when the pressure will take its toll.
“I’m around a lot of boats between competitors and local traffic. A lot of fish are being caught in that area and I don’t know how long it is going to hold up for. I know there are another 21 to 23 pounds there, it is getting harder and harder to catch that bag every day.”
Alex Redwine, who sits in 7th with 44-9, agrees.
“I feel like the fish are starting to get pressured and are starting to shy away when you cast baits on them,” he said.
New waiting on a call
This week, New has been fishing with more excitement and anxiousness than usual, and not because he caught a limit of smallmouth measuring 23-12 to move into the Top 10 with 44-2.
New and his wife Brittany are expecting the birth of their son and while the projected due date isn’t until later next week, things could start progressing as early as this weekend. If and when he gets the call, he’ll pack up the boat and head to the airport and catch a flight home.
“My baby is due Aug, 7 and my wife is far enough along that we are hoping it doesn’t happen this week. If it doesn’t happen this weekend, we are going on Monday night to start the induction,” New said. “But it could happen anytime now. As soon as I knew I had 10 grand in the box, I called (tournament director) Lisa (Talmadge) and made sure it was okay to call Brittany and check on her.
“If I get the call, I’m throwing the rod down and getting on a plane. We come to a tournament and you want to win, but at the end of the day there are a lot more tournaments and I can’t get the birth of my son back.”
Weather watch
The real curveball on Semifinal Saturday will once again be the weather. More storms are expected to enter the area during the morning hours, with forecasts calling for rain right around takeoff time. How long it takes the storms to move through and then how long the clouds linger will greatly impact who makes it to Championship Sunday.
