Posted -  April 25th, 2008 9:42pm CST

26-01 Makes the Cut......Top Ten Ready for Saturday

Story by Dru Smith - Photos by Dan O'Sullivan & Matt Pangrac

Huntsville, NC – Ten pros remain after Fridays round to vie for the $200,000 first place winnings. Before zeroing the weights from the first two days, only 26 ounces separated the remaining 10 competitors. If the weekend results hold course those same 26 ounces could mean the difference between $200,000.00 for first and $20,000.00 for the tenth place finisher, or $6,923.00 per ounce.

Quality fish definitely have a high price on their heads for this weekend. Art Ferguson III demonstrated the importance of one bite on Friday. His 6 pound, 5 ounce Snicker’s Big Bass anchored the Michigan angler’s 14 pound limit and moved him up from 29th to finish day two in 6th.

Brent Ehrler won the hearts of many fishing fans during last year’s run of the Ultimate Match Fishing season. On Friday, the 2006 FLW Champion showed what he can do on tour as he posted a second consecutive 13 + pound stringer to secure a place in the finals with an overall weight of 27-05.

Sean Hoernke has taken almost $400,000.00 from the Wal-Mart FLW organization, but it has been since January 2006 that the man from Magnolia has cracked the top ten on Tour. Boosted by his 15 pound day one limit, Sean added 12-11 to his creel on Friday to finish the qualify rounds in the number one spot. 

With Ehrler securely in second, Jim Moynagh held onto to the third spot with a two day total of 27 pounds. Coming in fourth with a two day total of 26-14, Chris Baumgardner is the only North Carolinian to make it to the finals.

Scott Canterbury, the day one leader, caught enough bass – five for eight pounds—to make the cut at number 8.

Hoernke Hopes For Shad Spawn
Sean Hoernke is in his fifth year as a FLW Tour pro. 2007 matched his worse year on tour. In fact, Sean has struggled to recreate the magic of his rookie season when he finished 16th in the AOY standings. His last win came in 2006 at Lewis Smith Lake were he took the lead on day two and never looked back.

Sean heads to the finals after weighing the biggest two day total. After relying on the post-spawn, shad eating bass to get to through day one, Sean made some adjustments on Friday. “They (shad ) need the warm nights to spawn. Today, I ran a backup pattern. Thankfully, everything I saved yesterday saved me today.”

Sean’s backup pattern entails looking at the fish and Saturday’s expected boat traffic could hamper his efforts. “Tomorrow will be a whole new game. The next two days the water could get really blasted.”

Sean is hopeful the shad spawn will kick back off on next two days. “It could happen again tomorrow. In practice I felt like the timing was a little early, but we will have to wait and see.”

Early Bite Key for Ehrler
Brent Ehrler just missed the top ten cut last year on Lake Norman finishing the ’07 event in 13th. “I really didn’t feel like I catching them that good here. I started on a nice bed fish yesterday and it just kept getting better from there. I knew it was going to take a couple of lucky bites. I got them last year for one day; I’ve done for two days this year.”

Brent is covering a lot of different areas keying on the early bite. “I caught my limit by 7:30 this morning. You only have a small window to get bit on the swim bait.”

Brent is looking for areas that post-spawn and pre-spawn bass are staging and caught nearly 20 keepers on Friday. “You catch a lot, but they are all the same size. I’ve got a couple of lucky bites that have made the difference. Everything has gone really well for me this week. Once I had my limit and knew that I had made $10,000.00, I could relax.”

The weather doesn’t seem to be a factor for what Ehrler has been doing. “I would rather have the sun, but if it is cloudy I will throw the swim bait more and hopefully get a big bite.”

Past Key for Jim
Jim Moynagh is another angler who enjoys his trips to Lake Norman. He finished the 2007 FLW Tour stop here in 6th place. After posting 14-10 on day one, Jim added 12-06 to his total on Friday qualifying him for his second top ten finally at Lake Norman.

“The timing is very close to last year. We were more into the spawn last year, but it is very similar. I’m fishing some of the same areas and doing what worked last year.” 

Jim only had 7 keepers take his bait on Friday, but his last two fish of the day were worth the wait. “I had absolutely no morning bite. I caught one fish in the first two hours. With about 30 minutes left to fish I caught my biggest fish and shortly after that I caught my second best bass. It wasn’t easy that’s for sure.” Jim’s big fish (4-07 pounds) bit a weightless worm skipped around a dock. 

Baum goes to Bed
Chris Baumgardner is the lone “local” fishing the finals. Hailing from nearby Gastonia, Chris has used his knowledge of the lake to boat more than 26 pounds through the first two days of the tournament. “I’m mostly fishing for bedding fish. A lot of them are on the backs of the docks and under the floats.” Chris is flipping a weightless trick worm to the beds.

Chris located a bunch of spawning fish in practice, but he hasn’t had to visit all of them. “I’ve only beat up one little area. I pulled in there and no other boats were around so I just stayed and fished. I will probably fish some new areas tomorrow.”

With the weather predicted to take a turn for the worse, Baumgardner isn’t worried about the change. “It stormed in practice and I still caught them. I’m catching about what I did before the tournament started.”

Two in a Row for Browne
Glenn Browne finished 9th at the last event and prior to the Lake Norman event he held down the number 5 spot in Land O Lakes AOY race. Known more for his ability with a flipping stick, Glenn has relied on his sight for the majority of the 26-12 he weighed in during the opening rounds. “I’m running down the bank looking at them. I haven’t done much of it (sight fishing) but sometimes you‘ve got to do what you have to.”

During practice, Glenn tried the dock patterns, but couldn’t get the quality bites. He plans to continue the sight fishing unless the conditions change. “They (spawning bass) haven’t been that hard to catch. I went back to the same areas and more fish have moved up. If it gets cloudy, I think I can catch them on a top-water bait. It worked in practice.”

Work of Art for Ferguson
Art Ferguson, III has been a mainstay on the Tour since 2005 with his best finishing coming in 2006 on Lake Champlain where 31 pounds earned him $10,750 for 25th place. Saturday, Art will launch at Lake Norman with the knowledge he can do no worse than 10th.

90 minutes of persistent bed fishing paid off for Art on Friday. Having spent an hour Thursday on the eventual Snicker’s Big Bass of the day, Art returned to the stubborn bedder on Friday determined to put her in the boat. 

“When I first pulled up another angler was trying to catch her. I came back after I caught my limit and decided to spend another hour trying to get her to bite.”

The angle of approach available for Art meant he had to cast and possibly retrieve the bass over a dock. “When she bit, all I could do was hold her head up. My co-angler had the net and almost fell in the lake. I grabbed him and the net and we got her in the boat.”

Ferguson’s 6-05 pound female bolstered his day two weight enough to put him squarely in the finals. With the weekend plans set, Art is unsure of his chances to win. I’m just going to go fish again. I don’t have anymore good fish found, but I do have some deeper water fish located. My early limit came off the deeper stuff.

Notable
Saving fish for the finals or even for a place in the finals is a tactic unique to FLW. Sometimes it works and sometimes it can cost an angler. Such was the case for Aaron Hastings on Friday. “I found a dock that had about six fish spawning on it during Thursday’s round. I caught two and left the rest for today. When I got there today a construction crew was installing a boat lift on that dock. The water got muddy and the fish disappeared.” 

Aaron still managed to bring in 12 pounds on Friday, but he missed the cut by less than a pound finishing this tournament in 14th..

THE TOP 100 DAY 2 STANDINGS