Elite

LeHew’s morning flurry

After two consistent days, Shane LeHew found himself sitting in fifth place heading into Day 3 of the Simms Bassmaster Elite at Lake Fork.

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Photography by
Kyle Jessie
After two consistent days, Shane LeHew found himself sitting in fifth place heading into Day 3 of the Simms Bassmaster Elite at Lake Fork.
The North Carolina pro started his day like a true Carolina angler and threw a topwater across a point and immediately went to catching them.
LeHew had blowups on three or four consecutive casts to start the morning.
Although none of his early on were true Lake Fork giants, they certainly helped his confidence.
The wind crashing waves into the point made it difficult for the fish to track down the bait. Each fish he caught on a topwater took a couple of blowups before the fish got the bait.
Within the first 20 minutes of fishing time, LeHew already had over 10 pounds.
LeHew had one single lane between trees that he was making long casts between. As we’ve seen a lot this week, he rotated through a number of baits.
Once the fish became conditioned to the topwater, LeHew began chunking and winding a crankbait and immediately got bit.
Truly a miracle that this fish stayed hooked.
Luckily LeHew was able to land this solid keeper.
A spinning rod was LeHew’s next weapon of choice.
Once a bait change was made, results came almost immediately. His first cast with a spinning rod yeilded a keeper.
Things got tricky with the spinning rod. The gap between trees was fairly narrow, and naturally LeHew had less control of the fish with the lighter line.
LeHew generated more bites with a spinning rod, but the quality of fish went down.
With relatively high winds, LeHew kept his rod tip low to keep his line from bowing up.
Although this wasn’t a big one, this is pretty much a nightmare scenario when fishing with light line. After hooking up, the fish instantly got wrapped up in a tree.
Somehow the fish never came off.
LeHew will need to cull this fish out of his limit if he wants to get to the weight he’s had for the last two days, but at this point in the morining a keeper is a keeper.
No time to waste as LeHew makes a cast while waiting to sign his scorecard.
On that exact cast, LeHew hooks up. This time with a good fish.
LeHew boat flips this 4-3.
Now he’s heading in the right direction.
Swing and a miss for LeHew.
After thoroughly working the point, LeHew works down the bank before making a move up lake.

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