As 19-year-old Cody Abbott completed his post-weigh-in interviews on Day 2 of the 2026 Turtlebox Bassmaster Open at Lake Norman presented by Battery Tender, Elite Series pro Logan Parks walked by and gave him a pat on the shoulder.
It was a full circle moment of sorts for Abbott, who rallied to catch 17 pounds, 9 ounces on Friday to vault himself to his first Top 10 of his young Opens career with a total of 31-3. After all, Parks is largely the reason Abbott is in this position to begin with.
“This has always been a dream,” he said. “I’m fishing against a lot of really good people. Kyoya Fujita slid into this tournament without anyone knowing. It has put a lot of pressure on me, because I know I’m fishing against guys who have either been Elites or are Elites.”
With a second-place finish at Logan Parks INSANE Tournament last November at Lake Martin, the Lander University student-angler earned paid entries into a division of the 2026 Bassmaster Opens. He chose Division I, and as it stands the Woodruff, S.C. youngster is 18th in the standings.
If you look at the body of work, it isn’t all that surprising that Abbott is excelling in his first year in the Opens. As a high school sophomore, he came to the realization that bass fishing was the path he wanted to pursue in life.
As a member of the Byrnes High School fishing team, a then 17-year-old Abbott won the Bassmaster High School National Championship at Lake Hartwell with partner Mitchell Robinson, a tournament that featured over 400 boats from across the country.
That victory only added fuel to his passion.
“Going fishing is what I want to do my whole life,” Abbott, who’ll turn 20 next week, said. “I’m just ate up with it, so I might as well go do it for a living.”
At Lander so far, Abbott has two Top 10s to his name, one at Sam Rayburn this season and another at Lake Okeechobee in 2025.
Entering this week’s event, Abbott had only fished Lake Norman a handful of days, and while it looks similar to Lake Hartwell where he grew up, it doesn’t fish much like the South Carolina impoundment. It does, however, set up a lot like Lake Martin.
While it took him a little while to dial the bite in, Abbott made the most of his practice time and made sure not to set the hook before it mattered.
“I think I caught nine fish in three days of practice,” he explained. “I ended up coming back to a place today and caught a 4-12 that I shook off in practice.”
The top priority for this season is to make the Elite Qualifier round, and this week’s performance has helped that effort tremendously. He’s only 3 pounds back of the lead heading into Saturday’s final competition day, visions of fishing the Bassmaster Classic on his home lake started flashing in his head.
“I’d really really like to make the 2027 Classic,” he said. “My chances are pretty high this week, so I’m going to try and make it happen.”
