Lakeland, Fla.
– For the briefest of moments, Bobby Lane found himself uttering words that almost no other angler has ever spoken: “It was unfortunate that KVD didn’t win two years in a row at Kentucky Lake.”
But then he reconsidered. “The hell with it,” he said. “It was my time. Nobody can ever take anything away from him, but at every tournament I’m after every one of them. I don’t care who it is, or what their names are. I want to whip every one of them.”
For one week, at Kentucky Lake, he fished his wish. Lane, normally thought of as a shallow water flipper, located an unbelievable school of fish and led the fifth Elite Series event of the year from wire to
wire.
(Photos
by Mark Jeffreys & Matt Pangrac)
Despite stumbling over the season’s last two tournaments, finishing 74th and 97th at the Mississippi River and Oneida, respectively, the points he earned in Tennessee contributed to his third straight Bassmaster Classic qualification.
Now that he’s won at the Elite level, he wants more. “I’m starting to chip away at my goals,” he said. “I want to eventually leave this sport as a force to be reckoned with, not just a guy who caught some fish.”
The next chip he wants to knock off is a big one. “Right now my goal is to win Angler of the Year and a Classic, and since the Classic is the next tournament, that’s the one I’m focused on.”
Tennessee Triumph
For Lane, the Kentucky Lake victory was sweet in multiple ways. Not only did it put a hundred grand in his pocket, but it allowed him to strengthen his own view of himself as well as others’ view of his skills. In his previous Elite Series crack at the big water straddling Kentucky and Tennessee he’d finished 58th, and when he went there with the FLW tour he “ended up in the hundreds somewhere.”
While his offshore skills have improved in the years since he went out on tour full-time, he wasn’t yet convinced that he’d win a deepwater slugfest. One key element in his increased confidence was the electronics he uses. “If I wouldn’t have had the Humminbird 1197, I wouldn’t have won,” he said. “It made it so easy. With only 2 ½ days to practice, you can spend a half day on the bank, find out where to catch 10 pounds, and then go offshore and find those five and six pounders. It opens up a whole lot more water.”
He believes the victory boosted not only his self-image but also the perception of him held by others. “It shows that I’m not just a flipper,” he stated. “If I would win down here (in Florida) it would’ve been more expected.”
“It was just about time,” he continued. “I knew I had it in me somewhere and to beat Kevin VanDam made it even a little bit better.”
Third Straight Classic
Lane’s first two Classic finishes – a 4th at Hartwell in 2008 and a 16th at the Red River this year – were more than respectable, but in a tournament where just about everyone but the winner is forgotten, they’re essentially ancient history. He’s looking forward to Alabama in February and expects that he’ll be able to bring out his flipping stick at Lay Lake. Even though he’s never been there he’s intimately familiar with how Boyd Duckett won on Lay in 2007, and while he believes that “spotted bass will play a factor,” he expects the Coosa River impoundment to fish to his strengths.
“You won’t have to fish a weenie worm there,” he said. “It’s more power fishing, which is my style. And there’s matted grass. That’s where Boyd Duckett got his two big bites.”
While the financial security that would come with the half-million dollar top prize and the resulting endorsements would certainly alter his life, Lane claims that he’ll “try to leave the financial part out of (his game plan)” and fish the Classic as if it were a regular season event.
“You can never underestimate the guys fishing behind you if you’re in a top ten or top twelve situation,” he explained. “Look at (Brian) Snowden losing a 10 pound lead last year and Aaron Martens almost took a spill this year at Guntersville. With this group if you think 18 pounds is great and you catch 18 pounds, you’re usually in about 10th place. These guys don’t hold anything back. They’re all great fishermen and that makes me a better fisherman.”
Right Place at the Right Time
He believes that at any given Elite Series stop between 50 and 60 anglers have a legitimate shot at winning the tournament, but he went against the conventional wisdom when he noted that luck often plays a role in the final outcome, and that he’d “rather be lucky than good.”
He pointed back at his erratic 2009 season as a shining example of the lack of predictability in professional bass fishing. The week after he won at Kentucky Lake, he zeroed a day at Iowa. After that tough tournament, he went to the Potomac and won a Stren event. Then he went to Oneida and due to a culling error he ended up with a zero for the first day.
“It’s kind of weird how life goes,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever taken a zero in my life and then I did it in the same month where I won” and again a short time later.
He’s hoping that his next major tournament, the Classic, will be on the upswing of his roller coaster ride. He’ll bring a bit of the old (his flipping stick), a bit of the new (his side-imaging electronics) and confidence born of recent success and try to take professional bass fishing’s most prestigious pride. He’ll once again have to beat KVD to get there, but now that he’s done it, it doesn’t seem as daunting as it once did.
No matter what happens, Bobby Lane feels comfortable with the way his career is progressing. “Life is good,” he said. “I’m really looking forward to the next several years. I expect to be learning more and more and making fewer and fewer mistakes.”
