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Norman, Okla. – As they did in the first week of April when the Bassmaster Elite Series was at Falcon Lake in Zapata, Tex. and The Wal Mart FLW Tour was at Lewis Smith Lake in Jasper Ala. both of bass fishing’s major leagues will be competing for the viewers attentions as they will be competing concurrently on different bodies of water.
Elite Series pros will be competing in the Carolina Clash on South Carolina’s Lake Murray, while FLW Tour pros will be 940 miles to the west on Arkansas’ Beaver Lake. The last time the two tours went head to head, the variance in event styles was as large as the winner’s individual weights.
Elite Series pros hit Falcon Lake at precisely the right time to load the scales with huge bags as Paul Elias of Laurel, Miss. Threw deep diving crankbaits and a Carolina rig to set a new record 132 pounds, 8 ounces over four days of competition. Meanwhile Roseville, California’s Michael Bennett picked up a spinning rod and finessed 52 pounds, 9 ounces of bass from around Smith Lake’s docks to eventually claim the top prize.
That week in April marked the first time that The BASS ZONE provided on location coverage of both the Elite Series and the FLW Tour at the same time. The same will happen this week as Mark Jeffreys and ‘The Legend’ Harold Allen will be at Lake Murray and Matt Pangrac and Chad Morgenthaler will be at Beaver Lake to bring you the BZ Live Chat, our exclusive photography and Wide Open videos daily.
In light of the second such historical occurrence, The BASS ZONE contacted two pros from each tournament to provide previews of the events. South Carolina’s own Ray Sedgwick and Jason Quinn talked to The BASS ZONE about Lake Murray, while Morgenthaler and fellow FLW Tour pro Clark Wendlandt provide insight into what to expect out of Beaver Lake.
Elite Series Carolina Clash
Ray Sedgwick spent many years competing on Lake Murray before making the leap to bass fishing’s big leagues, he said he hasn’t fished it much since moving to the tour level, but he has enjoyed a good deal of success on the lake in the past.
“I won a Red Man tournament there and several team tournaments over the years,” Sedgwick said. “It’s a great fishery, but with the conditions it will fish differently than it has in the past.” The Cross S.C. pro is referring to the fact the area has received significant rainfall this year and the lake is a little above full pool.
“As far as the water conditions goes, the lake is higher than full pool, and that is going to affect the way the anglers are going to fish,” he said. “The water is in the buck brush and the bass will be there as well.” He said that he expects to see around 20 pounds a day be the winning weight.
“I expect that a lot of different techniques are going to play into the game plan this week,” Sedgwick said. “Topwater, flipping and floating worms could all be effective, but what will be important is that people key on baitfish movement.” A task that that is often easier said than done on a blue back herring lake.
“Timing is going to be very important,” the Keelshield pro said. “As the herring move around, so will the bass, and being where they come into contact with each other will be vital to doing well at Lake Murray.” With all of that said, Sedgwick thinks that they are hitting the lake at just the right time.
“I think that a large majority of the fish will be in post spawn, and that should mean good fishing; it should be a good week.”
Like Sedgwick, Jason Quinn of York, S.C. has a lot of history on Murray, and he too is looking forward to the Carolina Clash. “This event could be won anywhere from the bank to about 10 feet deep,” the 36-year-old pro said. “The lake has been low for several years, which has allowed the shoreline cover to grow; couple a cold winter that killed the hydrilla, high water, and this lake will fish differently than most have seen it.”
The shoreline cover Quinn referred too is a combination of pine tree saplings and a second type of vegetation the locals refer to as ‘Dog Fennel,’ a sort of fern like plant with a woody base that grows in the region. “This new cover has been growing for a couple of years, and with the lake being above full pool will have the bass in the shallows in masses,” he said.
He says that weather conditions are going to play a significant role in the outcome. “We’ve had some wicked weather whipping through the area recently,” Quinn told The BASS ZONE. “It’s not supposed to get any better either as they are calling for lows in the 40’s for a couple of days this week with winds gusting up to 30 miles per hour, I’m sure glad I’ll be in my Champion 210,” he said giggling
Even with the difficult conditions, Quinn concurs with Sedgwick that it will take nearly 20 pounds a day to win at Murray. “The fish are in a spawn / post spawn mode, and they can be exploited,” said the Evan Williams Bourbon pro. “I think that spinnerbaits and topwater baits could be big producers, as will shaky heads, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see boat docks keeping a lot of us busy this week.”
FLW Tour at Beaver Lake
The last time the FLW Tour came through Rogers, Ark. Jasper Engines and Transmissions pro Chad Morgenthaler placed 6th; his highest finish on the FLW Tour. But, he said that while he is extremely comfortable on the lake, his experiences from last year are not going to help him this year.
Morgenthaler said that he spent last year doing two primary things, throwing a shaky head and a Reaction Innovations Vixen topwater bait. “I had three or four deep water areas that produced better than average sized spots on the shaky head,” the BASS ZONE’s FLW Tour on location co-host said. “I caught a few key largemouth on the Vixen, and that really pushed me over the top.”
The reason his success last year won’t be much of a help to him in 2008, is because Like Murray, Beaver Lake is also above full pool. “Everything is different this year,” Morgenthaler reported. “I told Debbie (his wife of almost 19 years) as I was rigging my rods that there’s no way this is Beaver Lake; there’s nothing less than 15-pound Trilene on any of them.”
He said that the high, muddy water would force most of the field to abandon the spinning rods that dominated things last year down and adopt a much more powerful approach. “The water reminds me of a Louisiana or Oklahoma fishery right now,” he said. “It is so dirty that I think I could plant corn in some of the backwaters, and I think that guys will have to adopt an approach that targets shallow water hard cover.”
With two FLW Tour Level wins (1999 and 2001) on Beaver Lake to go along with three other top 10’s (2000, 2002 and 2004), Leander, Tex. pro Clark Wendlandt is as solid a bet to win as anyone on the FLW Tour. In those five finishes alone, Wendlandt has earned nearly 32-percent ($460,000) of his career FLW earnings of $1,442,990.
“I’ve fished Beaver Lake every year since 1997 and I have a lot of experience on the lake,” he said. “The advantage I have is that I have fished it when it was this high, and a lot of the other guys have not.” So, given his success, and his experience with the lake, Wendlandt feels that there are a few things that will make it a good event.
“The water being this high will spread things out a bit, as well as make it a little more difficult to find a quality pattern,” revealed Wendlandt. “With that being said, I think that there will be a decent chance we could encounter some schooling fish, and I think that there will be a decent shaky head bite around some of the docks on the clearer sections of the main lake.”
Wendlandt said that he thinks it will take some fairly heavy stringers to win at Beaver this week. “The water is high, but it has been for some time, so the fish should be adjusted to it,” he said. “I’m excited about the event, I really like Beaver Lake, and the conditions will make it fish a little differently, so I’m really looking forward to it.”
The BASS ZONE’s coverage of both the Elite Series Carolina Clash and The fourth stop on the Wal Mart FLW Tour will begin on Wednesday with preview videos from Mark and ‘The Legend’ from South Carolina and Matt Pangrac and Morgenthaler from Arkansas. Tournament coverage will begin Thursday with Live Chat, photo galleries, game day stories and of course the crew will be going Wide Open for our on location videos featuring interviews with the leaders, so, Stay Tuned!
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