Event: 2019 Toyota Bassmaster Texas Fest benefiting Texas Parks & Wildlife Department
What I faced: Finishing fifth in your first visit to a highly pressured fishery’s not too shabby, but one fish has stuck in Gustafson’s head since his Lake Fork debut. That one bass would have filled his first day’s limit and significantly improved his performance.
“I had a good week and a great event, but the first day, I only had four fish and the first one was, like, a 14-incher,” Gustafson said. “I had three big ones and half a fish and missed getting my limit. Then I put together big bags the next three days and that bad first day hurt me.
“Brandon Cobb won that tournament by a lot so I probably would not have won, but I should’ve had a pretty good shot at second and a shot at a Century Club belt.”
As Gustafson recalls, the early-May event saw mostly stable conditions. A strong storm system blew through the area the night before the event, but tournament days offered nice fishing conditions.
With a good number of the Texas fish still spawning, Gustafson spent much of his practice time marking beds. Unfortunately, the big rains that fell right before the tournament began muddied the shallows and took his sight-fishing plan off the table.
Gustafson would shift gears for Days 2 through 4, but he said that early stumble cost him a few leaderboard spots.
“I went and tried to catch some off beds early, but I couldn’t see them and didn’t catch any,” he said. “That was my downfall the first day, because there was a shad spawn happening on some of the flat points, which is a popular thing I’ve taken advantage of many times since then.”
What I did: Once he realized the sight fishing plan was not gonna happen, Gustafson transitioned to Lake Fork’s offshore hard spots. His 18 1/2-pound bag landed him in 24th place.
Days 2 through 4 saw Gustafson start on the shad spawn and then mixed in some more of the offshore stuff. Adding a second-round limit of 26-5 moved him up to seventh.
“On Day 2, I had a 20-pound limit probably in the first five minutes,” Gustafson said. “You’d pull up and they were just blowing up on this point, and it was pretty easy to catch a couple of nice ones on lightly-weighted 5- to 7-inch Z-Man Jerk Shadz and on a topwater.
“I did that for the next three days and mixed in some big fish on offshore structure. That led to a good event for me.”
A Day 3 limit of 22-1 got him to Championship Sunday in ninth place, while the final day saw Gustafson weigh his biggest bag of the week, 27-7, and tally 94-5. Clearly a solid performance, but Gustafson knows that one of Fork’s abundant 6-pounders would have put him closer to the top of the leaderboard — and locked up that Century Club accolade.
“I always think about that first day and how I kinda messed up,” Gustafson said. “Those Century belts are pretty cool, and it would be nice to have one.”
Spending all four days of the event on the west side of Lake Fork Creek — the lake’s western/main arm — Gustafson found his offshore fish by scanning around and finding hard spots off points and stick outs in 8 to 15 feet. He described most as inconspicuous but near the obvious stuff.
Gustafson did his offshore work with big crankbaits, a big Scrounger and a swimbait. He tried the traditional slower summer presentations, but the fish were largely disinterested.
“I could not catch one dragging a football jig or a worm; you had to get a reaction out of them,” Gustafson said. “All I could think of was that they weren’t big-time schooled yet and just getting out to the offshore deeper stuff.
“I caught one or two on a bucktail jig but most of them came on moving baits. They were just really keyed in on baitfish, more so than eating stuff off the bottom.”
Tactical details: Gustafson found most of his shad spawn fish on flat, clay points in 2 to 3 feet of water. Some spots had stumps and brush, but wherever he encountered those early fish, his approach and response were key.
“I’d see them blowing up, I’d hook the first one, I’d put my Minn Kota Talons down and I’d usually catch two or three,” Gustafson said. “If I’d go five minutes without catching another one, I’d pull the Talons up.
“Several times, as soon as I’d put those Talons up it would create a little bite window. The Talons make a noise when they’re fully retracted and that would spook the bait. The fish would start blowing up and going nuts again so I could catch a couple more. At first, it was just incidental, but after a few times, I was ready for it.”
What made the difference: Acknowledging that he went into the tournament hoping to sight fish, Gustafson pulled the plug on that deal around 10 a.m. Definitely a good adjustment, but looking back, he wishes he had adjusted in time to catch that first day’s shad spawn opportunity.
“I thought (sight fishing) would be a more important program than it ended up being for me,” Gustafson said. “I didn’t end up weighing any sight fish; it ended up being a shad spawn and offshore deal.
“I got more dialed in as the event went on. In practice, I caught a few off the shad spawn, but maybe I didn’t realize how powerful it was until I started to score on it in the tournament. I realized on Day 2 that it would be a bigger deal for me. That made life a lot more enjoyable for me.”
Gustafson said the change that could’ve made the biggest impact for him was his Day 1 pivot.
“I wish I would have been smarter the first day and not been so stubborn on the bed fish,” he said. “I knew they would be harder to catch, because they were harder to see. At this point in my career, I probably would have just lifted the trolling motor and kept rolling.
“When I went out to this offshore place on Day 1, I caught a 6-pounder, I threw up there again and caught another 6-pounder. I didn’t get another bite, so I ran around a bunch of other places, came back and caught another good 5-pounder.”
On paper, a Top 10’s always great!
“It ended up being a great tournament, but that was a costly Day 1 to not put it all together.”
What I learned: To that point, Gustafson said his first visit to Lake Fork ingrained an important truth about competing at the sport’s top level.
“I think it’s just to be successful throughout the season on the Elite Series, you have to make good decisions in a timely manner,” he said. “I didn’t adjust to the conditions, and that was my downfall.
“You gotta make good decisions and make them fast.”
