Elite

A look at Chickamauga Lake

Posted on
Captions by
Mike Suchan
It will be hard to follow the Century Belts earned during the previous Elite event on Santee Cooper Lakes, but there should be plenty of monster bass brought in during this week’s Guaranteed Rate Bassmaster Elite at Chickamauga Lake out of Dayton, Tenn.
Buddy Gross, who is sponsored by Fish Lake Chickamauga, said topping 100 pounds might be a big ask, but it’s not out of the question. “There are going to be some giants brought to the scales,” he said. “They’re gonna be big, fat and healthy — and if a few people can find several of those kind of fish, you could see another event like we just had at Santee Cooper, Century Belts included.”
Because it has that big fish potential, Chickamauga has ranked among the top 10 in Bassmaster Magazine’s Best Bass Lakes the past several years. The lake is a 59-mile long reservoir of the Tennessee River that covers 36,240 square acres, has 810 miles of shoreline and a maximum depth of 78 feet.
Competition days are April 7-10, with blastoff at 7 a.m. ET each morning from Dayton Boat Dock. The weigh-ins are set for 3 p.m. at Point Park/Dayton Boat Dock. All 94 Elites fish two days before a cut to 47 for Semifinal Saturday then 10 advance to Championship Sunday.
This will be the seventh pro level Bassmaster tournament on Chickamauga Lake. Denny Brauer won the first in 1990, averaging 16 pounds a day, and Larry Nixon won a Megabucks the following year.
It was 23 years later that Bassmaster returned to Chickamauga for the 2014 BASSfest, then Opens were held on the fishery in 2017 and 2019. Chad Pipkens shows what can be caught in Chick with his 9-8 that took big bass in 2019.
John Cox, the current leader of the Progressive Bassmaster Angler of the Year race, won both of the Opens on Chickamauga. He totaled 68-3 over three days in April of 2017 then caught 66-5 in the late May tournament of 2019 to win.
The most recent event there was the twice-postponed 2020 Elite. Originally scheduled for February, high water forced its move then COVID-19 pushed it back again to Oct. 16-19, the third of back-to-back-to-back events. Fall fishing on Chick was stingy, but Jake Whitaker of Fairview, N.C., caught limits each day to finish third.
Mike Huff of Corbin, Ky., only had three fish on Day 1 when only 29 of the 85 Elites caught limits. Huff rallied with the biggest bag of Day 3 at 19-1.
Huff then landed the Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the event, a 7-13, that helped him to the Championship Monday’s biggest bag of 18-6, but he couldn’t top Texan Lee Livesay.
Slow and steady won the event for Livesay, who was 10th after Day 1 with 13-0 then jumped to third with 13-3. His 16-13 limit pushed Livesay to the top of the leaderboard after Semifinal Sunday.
Livesay threw a frog into the Chickamauga grass flats, catching 15-2 to win with 58-2, 1-12 ahead of Huff. He and Whitaker were the only anglers to bring in limit all four days.
Livesay was overcome with emotion with his first title in B.A.S.S. “I’ve been wanting this my whole life. That’s 35 years of dreaming and a lot of hard work,” said Livesay, who won his second Elite in 2021 on Lake Fork where he guides.
The forecast for Dayton, Tenn., is not what host Rhea County Economic Development & Tourism Council would have ordered, with cold mornings and windy days. But the afternoons should be pleasant for the expo and weigh-ins.
The weather might keep some weekend anglers off the water and lower the pressure, something Gross said can affect how Chickamauga fishes. Gross reported a recent one-day event was won with 37 pounds, which included a 12-8 kicker, but he said whoever gets closest to 90 pounds should win this week. “Unless somebody really, really finds that magic spot, 100 pounds is going to be tough,” he said. “It can happen; I think a man could catch four days of 30 pounds pretty easy, but it will take the absolute perfect storm.”
Watch it unfold live as all four days will be available on Bassmaster.com and the FOX Sports digital platforms. FS1 will also broadcast live with the tournament leaders on Saturday and Sunday beginning at 8 a.m. ET.

Related