All posts by hellabass

Smith Mountain Fantasy Fishing Group Winner!

April 30, 2009 hellabass

Congratulations to Brad Longerbone from MN, he was the highest scoring member of my Bassin’ Blog group for ESPN Fantasy Fishing at the Smith Mtn Lake event. He also won my FLW group, but received a nice Berkley Prize Pack for his efforts, so someone else will win this group prize. What a solif Fantasy Fishing week for Brad!!!

Brad had a nice event and slid up to 3rd in the group standings, lets see if he can keep it going and catch our leader J Mayer.

Brief email interview with Brad and this is what he had to say on his strategy:
“I just got lucky, its the same lineup I set for the Bassmasters Classic on the Red River”
Who would have thought that the team picked for the Red River would win on Smith Mountain?

His winning team was:
Todd Faircloth
Kevin VanDam
Steve Kennedy
Greg Hackney
Matt Herren

For Brad’s efforts, he has won a bag of Tru-Tungsten finesse worms, should be great for catching our clear water bass!!

Thanks to Tru-Tungsten for helping out with the prizes.

Its not too late to join my group, prizes will be awarded at every tournament and year end.

Best regards,
The Commissioner
RichLindgren.com
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

Product Reviews, Sponsors

New Swim Jig Arsenal!

April 27, 2009 hellabass

I just recently ordered and received a big batch of custom swim jigs from Super K. I don’t throw a lot of different colors, so I just stocked up on the ones I normally throw. Hard to see from this picture, but I ordered all my jigs with custom red thread to tie the skirts. The two left colors (White Flash & Kizew Gill) are stock colors and the ones on the right are two of my favorite colors that I custom selected.

Left to Right: White Flash, Kizew Gill, Chocolate Sparkle, Purple Haze

The turn around time was awesome, i emailed my custom order in and got my jigs in just a few business days, not bad for custom hand tied jigs! If you are looking for some very high quality swim jigs, check them out here.

RichLindgren.com
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Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

BASS Tour, Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner, FLW Tour, Fun Fishing

Pool 2 early practice results

April 26, 2009 hellabass

Well let’s get right to the point!

Yep, no fish….. I did have two very good bites on a tube, they were either both pike or I had bad spots in my line on both hooksets, tough to say. I may have had a couple bites on a Rapala Fat 3 and a SWL Quickstrike spinnerbait, but tough to say. I spent most of the day alternating between a tube & a white swim jig. I also threw crankbaits, jerkbaits, spinnerbait and jigs. Kind of amased I could not get bit on reaction baits with water in the main channel at 54 degrees.

To add insult to injury, I snapped my transducer off my trolling motor and my FLW fantasy did not fall in the right order, so no big prizes this week.

I am hoping to get back out on Pool 2 this Saturday. Congrats to KVD for being a stud and winning on an unlikely body of water (Smith Mtn) for him and Stetson Blaylock had a great win on Lake Norman, former co-angler phenom, now FLW tour pro winner! Too bad Mr. Moynagh could not make surge today and get a big win.

Also look for announcements on group winners for my Fantasy Fishing leagues, I have got some new prizes this week!

RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner, Fun Fishing

Pool 2 Bass Fishing….

April 24, 2009 hellabass

Last weekend was busy with birthday parties for my 1 yard old daughter, last night & tonight are all about lawn work and then finally tomorrow, my first real bass fishing trip in my boat. I will probably be up late getting some new line on a few reels, most of them have terribly old line right now, plus i have 3 new reels, so it would be nice to get some line on those and get them broke in.

My plan is to get out on Pool 2, learn some of the water for a club tournament i have there in middle of May. I have never been there, so mostly this will be about learning some of the water, but I plan on doing some catching as well. The nice thing is if i find a wad of fish, I can sit there and catch them a bit, because they will likely move before the tournament. Check back for a fishing report Sunday or Monday. I do have some things in the work, where I may be able to get some film from this fishing trip, so stay tuned on that may reveal itself on the blog in the future.

Currently I am in the process of loading up the FLW live weigh in as well, fun to see how my Fantasy Fishing anglers are fairing, I got off to a pretty solid start on Day 1, with 5 anglers in the Top 10. Hey who knows, with a little luck and a couple exactas, maybe I could win some good prizes or the $100k!

Have a fun & safe weekend!
RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

BASS Tour, Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner

Setting an ESPN Fantasy Fishing Line-up for Smith Mountain Lake

April 22, 2009 hellabass

Happy Earth Day!

Smith Mountain Lake may be one of the toughest to pick all year. Clear deep water lake, with lots of pressure and boat traffic on the weekends. All indications say that sight fishing and finesse will be the ticket, but its been a little cool lately, so maybe some angler can get on a wad of big females in a pre-spawn stage.

The local talent pool is thing for this lake, few anglers from Virgina, John Crews is probably the closest to calling it his home lake.

After Smith mountain, you should probably be prepared to settle into a little groove with your roster on the next two TVA lakes.

Here are a few guys that I think would be solid picks that are not on my team. Ike, Kriet, John Murray & Mark Davis. The breakdown on my team is as follows:
KVD – He will likely be on my team all year, he should be near dominate on these TVA lakes, can’t give him up just because this may not be the best fit.
Matt Herren – For the money probably on my roster til the bitter end, just hope he grabs a Top 50.
Skeet Reese – Another horse to hitch my wagon to for the season
Alton Jones– Tough call to give Horton up, with Kentucky & Guntersville coming up, but Alton should do well & has a hot hand.
John Crews– G-Man kept proving me wrong, so the Crews Missile gets the nod this week for being local.

So here are my Smith Mountain picks, you will notice less change over this time:

Rich’s Roster
Angler 1	Angler 2	Angler 3	Angler 4	Angler 5

Kevin VanDam Kalamazoo, MI	Skeet Reese Auburn, CA	Alton Jones Waco, TX	John Crews Salem, VA	Matthew Herren Trussville, AL
MKT: $24.6 (+0.1) LKD: $24.5	MKT: $23.8 LKD: $23.8	MKT: $21.8 LKD: $21.8	MKT: $16.2 LKD: $16.2	MKT: $13.6 (+0.5) LKD: $13.1

Its not too late to join my group, prizes will be awarded at every tournament and year end.

Best regards,
The Commissioner
RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner, FLW Tour

Setting a FLW Fantasy Fishing Lineup for Lake Norman

April 21, 2009 hellabass

Lake Norman is the largest man made lake in North Carolina, it definitely seems to be a more of a numbers lake with both Largemouth & Spotted Bass. Widely known as a dock lake, also has a fair amount of rock & wood. Unlike Table Rock, most bass are likely to come fairly shallow. It is similar in the respect there is not much for grass, like the first tournament on Lake Guntersville.

Type of water: lowland impoundment of Catawba River
Surface acres: 32,500 acres
Shoreline: 520 miles
Average depth: approximately 30 feet
Max depth: 110 feet
Primary structure/cover: docks, piers, pilings, grass, stumps, lay-downs, rocks
Species: largemouth, spotted bass
Length minimum: 14 inches for all species

All indications is that this tournament will again be a combination of spawn & post-spawn fish. Shad spawn could play a roll as well for the top finishers. If you look to my previous post about how BassFan.com identified some Lake Norman studs, they are likely to play a large role in my angling, team, and maybe a little local flavor. BASS has fished Norman, but its been awhile, so I am skipping that research this time.

Remember Kim Bain suggested Brian Thrift & Alvin Shaw when I interviewed her….

Here are my other anglers to watch:
Brian Travis
Scott Cantebury
Jacob Powroznik

Basically I littered my lineup with anglers that are hot right now and have past experience and lots of wins & top 10’s this week. I think Jim Moynagh is due for a big win!

Finally, my lineup:

Rich’s Lake Norman Roster		Tour Stats
	Selected Anglers	Tournaments	Earnings	Missed Cuts	Avg Finish	Top 3	Top 10’s	Top 25’s	Wins
1	JIM MOYNAGH	76	$ 749,650	67	63	5	9	21	1
2	MICHAEL BENNETT	30	$ 1,377,850	24	54	3	6	12	2
3	BRENT EHRLER	29	$ 753,000	25	50	1	4	11	1
4	ANDY MORGAN	88	$ 679,854	74	49	2	12	29	1
5	SHINICHI FUKAE	36	$ 631,650	25	48	2	10	16	2
6	CRAIG POWERS	68	$ 536,950	59	66	5	9	15	1
7	DAVID DUDLEY	86	$ 1,343,100	69	43	7	16	35	2
8	GREG PUGH	49	$ 323,500	42	69	0	6	11	0
9	DAVID WALKER	87	$ 486,509	69	52	0	16	32	0
10	BRYAN THRIFT	19	$ 250,700	13	39	1	6	11	0

Its not too late to join my group, prizes will be awarded at every tournament and year end.

Best regards,
The Commissioner
RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner

Lake Norman Bass Fishing Sharks

April 17, 2009 hellabass

Hey all, next week we need to finalize our fantasy fishing picks for both Lake Norman and Smith Mountain Lakes. I saw some cool date that BassFan.com provided about the guys that have excelled the last two years at Norman FLW events.

Interestingly enough, there are 9 pros who finished inside the Top 30 at both the previous Norman events. Listed with their ’07 and ’08 finishes followed by average finish:
> Jim Moynagh — 6th, 2nd (4th-place average)
> Greg Pugh — 8th, 4th (6th-place average)
> Brent Ehrler — 13th, 6th (10th-place average)
> Michael Bennett — 7th, 18th (13th-place average)
> Andy Morgan — 12th, 11th (17th-place average)
> Craig Powers — 18th, 15th (17th-place average)
> Luke Clausen — 22nd, 25th (24th-place average)
> David Dudley — 24th, 28th (26th-place average)
> Tony Couch — 28th, 30th (29th-place average)

For FLW, Top 10’s are gold when it comes to Fantasy Fishing, so Jim Moynagh & Greg Pugh seem like no-brainers! Have a great weekend and look for a full analysis and my final picks for both tours early next week!

Best regards,
The Commissioner
RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

Fantasy Bass Fishing Corner, Fun Fishing

Tax Day Ramblings

April 15, 2009 hellabass

My taxes have long been done & the refund long been spent, so for those of you still scrambling, very unfortunate, great day to be fishing. Speaking of spending money, I recently bought a new Shimano Curado E7 & 2 new Shimano Stradic 2500 spinning reels. I bought the Curado, because its new, from Shimano and I just had to have one. I bought the new Stradics because I needed one new reel and I have heard that the new features on these reels almost eliminate line twist and wind knots and that will pay for itself come tournament time! Fortunately for all of you, spending all that money has caused me to dig a little deeper and list a ton more stuff on my Bass Fishing eBay Store. I have listed 4 Shimano reels (Stradic Mg, Calcutta, Castaic & Corsair), plus a ton of tackle (Sebile, Berkley, Jigs, etc.).

The weather has been beautiful the past two weeks, so I have had the boat out once briefly and stopped 3 times from shore to fish for some crappies. Bad news, no crappies and 1 baby northern pike, on the flip side jumping green bullheads really seem to like my crappie sized micro chatterbaits tipped with 2″ chunks of Gulp. I think I have caught 19 of those buggers….

Other random things…
Supposed there will be a Calamba Cup on World’s Greatest Fishing Show, featuring Zona & KVD against Swindle & Skeet. Should make for excellent TV Saturday morning, so set your DVRs.

My daughter Riely turns 1 on Friday, very exciting, big birthday party weekend, been busy getting house ready. Even better new, will be freed up for fishing after this weekend :0 Watch out Pool 2 bass!

Next week expect Fantasy Fishing lineups for both Norman & Smith Lakes. Plus, Tru-Tungsten has sent me a bunch their new hand pour worms for prizes, so sharpen your lineups, the prizes are great!

Lastly, this Saturday, I have a FREE Bass FIshing seminar at the Medina Entertainment center at 10:15am. Come and learn how you can be better at extracting bass from shallow heavy cover, you will not want to miss that! Details Here!

RichLindgren.com
Bass Fishing Today
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

BASS Tour, FLW Tour

Old Guys still getting it done!

April 9, 2009 hellabass

Seems like every time you start hearing guys talk about how professional bass fishing has become a young man’s game, then we have a weekend like this last weekend. Tommy Biffle lays down a convincing win at Wheeler and Guido Hibdon use his wisdom to top a 200 boat field at Lake Eufala. While these guys are not competing for AOY titles anymore, they still prove at any given tournament they are a threat to not only make final cuts, but bring it all home! The most exciting part of this, is that you may have a lot longer then you think to chase down your dream as a professional tournament angler.

Over the past few years, Denny Brauer, Guido Hibdon, Paul Elias, Tommy Biffle & David Fritts have all won tour events, some of these guys have won multiple times. This definitely is one of the many things that makes bass fishing exciting to follow and what a lot of avid bass anglers can relate to. One thing that seems apparent, is that when these guys do win, they seem to do it when conditions line up to their strengths. These guys don’t seem to win tournaments anymore by junk fishing and flying by the seat of their pants like they may have done in the past. Brauer’s victory on Champlain came courtesty of a strong bite flipping his signature jig, Elias claimed the all time heavy weight record at Falcon with the Kneel & Reel, and Fritt’s victories came largely on his DT Series crankbaits.

Photo: ESPN Outdoors/Seigo Saito

This past weekend on Wheeler, Biffle found a flooded creek to himself and flipped his key area to death with 3 primary baits:
> A 3/8 oz Lunker Lure Rattleback jig (black/blue) tipped with a Gene Larew Super Salt Biffle craw (black/blue w/ sapphire-blue claws)

> A Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver (black/red), Texas-rigged with a 5/16 oz Tru-Tungsten Worm weight & 4/0 Reaction Innovations BMF hook, & pegged with a Tru-Tungsten Smart Peg.

> An 8.5″ Gene Larew Biffle-O lizard (black-neon), which is a hollow-body & hollow-tail lizard. He Texas-rigged it with the same weight & pegging system, but upsized to a 5/0 Owner hook. Find Gene Larew Salt Craws & Biffle-O Lizards @ Basspro.com

Photo courtesty of BassFan.com
Guido Hibdon is a great finesse fisherman, but also an all time grinder, ecspecially when targeting post-spawn fish. He ended up targeting some small areas and had to wait the fish out, sometime making 30-40 casts to the same rock before igniting the bite. Here are the 3 techniques & baits that Guido relied on:
> Crankbait gear: 7′ medium-action JB Custom jig rod, Bass Pro Shops Johnny Morris Signature Series baticaster (6.3:1 ratio), 17- & 20-lb Berkley Trilene XT, Lucky Craft RC 2.5 (BPS exclusive) or C Flash 22 Cal. crankbait (chartreuse/black). Noted the bigger fish would not bite crankbaits with rattles in them.

> Jig gear: Same rod & reel, Berkley Trilene 100% fluorocarbon line, 1/4 oz Luck “E” Strike jig (brown-red), Luck “E” Strike Guido Bug trailer (brown/purple flake).

> Carolina rig gear: Same rod and reel, 20 lb Berkley Trilene 100% fluorocarbon line, 3/4 oz bullet weight, 3 glass beads, small barrel swivel, 14 lb Berkley Trilene 100% fluorocarbon leader (18″), 3/0 Gamakatsu EWG hook, Luck “E” Strike Shakey Tail worm (chartreuse/green-pumpkin). – Find Luck “E” Strike lures @ Basspro.com

Moral of the story, you can still learn plenty from the old timers of the sport and don’t take them for granted, because they can still flat catch’em!

RichLindgren.com
Rich’s Bassin’ Forum
Bass Fishing Tackle Blog

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Outdoors This Week Interview – April 4, 2009

April 8, 2009 hellabass

For those of you that were not able to get to on usaradio.com on Saturday morning, I recorded the interview and making it available via podcast in this post. The interview is with Rob Doherty, we talk about several topics, including Secret Weapon Recoil Rig, Drop Shot techniques, Fishing up north versus the deep south and Fantasy Fishing.

Give it a listen, there will be no transcript this time. I am sure most of you did not get up on Saturday, but the good news is I edited this down from over 30 minutes to around 17 minutes.

Outdoors This Week logo.
Let me know what you think? Please vote & let me know what you think, I am most curious to test out this voting feature for another cool blog feature that I think you will enjoy, so vote even in you only listen to a little of the podcast, PLEASE!