Birmingham, AL – You would be hard pressed to sit down and write a better ending to the 2010 Bassmaster Classic on Alabama’s Lay Lake. At the start of the final day of competition, the top three anglers were separated by a scant three ounces. Any one of the three of them could very easily walk away the winner by day’s end.
But this is bass fishing, and anything is possible. With the thaw the region has been experiencing all week, thanks to high, sunny skies, and a small front forecast to blow through during the final day, conditions were ripe for someone to break the 20-pound barrier that had been forecast all week long.
Kevin VanDam, the Day One leader, saw his margin evaporate Saturday as Oklahoma journeyman pro, who was seeking his first Classic title and Elite Series win, smash the day’s heaviest bag and claim the lead by two ounces. Just a single ounce behind VanDam was Todd Faircloth – also seeking his first Classic title in eight attempts – who hadn’t show any signs of backing down.
Photos
by Mark Jeffreys & Matt Pangrac
Aside from being bass fishing’s biggest stage, the Classic also has another very unique quality: the only position on the leader board that matters at the end of the day is first place. Since first place pays $500,000, and there are no points at stake, each spot below the top one is pretty much the equivalent of a set of steak knives when compared to the boost to one’s career and competitive chops the win certainly brings.
All week long, fishing’s “ground zero” has been Beeswax Creek, where the majority of the Top 10 have done their damage. VanDam spent the week fishing a shallower flat, while Faircloth and Kriet alternated around a 200-yard stretch of real estate – with Kriet staking claim to a small portion of the stretch, which he’s babied with stellar results.
The question coming into the final day of competition was would Beeswax hold out and provide enough weight for a win. As our “On the Water” team reported, both there was a lot more movement inside Beeswax by many of those who remained in the field after Saturday’s cut.
By the end of Sunday’s final weigh-in, the verdict was clear: Beeswax had the winning fish, but it was the fishing juggernaut that is Kevin VanDam who held the key. VanDam saved the best for last by sacking up the biggest bag of the week, weighing 19 pounds, 7 ounces.
VanDam left the stage with a three day total of 51-6 to claim his third Classic trophy by a five pound margin. If there was ever a doubt of VanDam’s dominance in the sport, doubt no more as with five Toyota Tundra Angler of the Year Titles, and three Bassmaster Classic titles, he’s officially the most dominant angler the sport has ever seen.
Jeff Kriet, after a heroic challenge to the VanDam legacy, ended the week in second place after everything was said and done. Kriet’s weight slid all week, but he still managed an impressive 14-5 on the final day, giving him 46-6 on the week.
Todd Faircloth, despite his final day gamble to find a big bite, ended the event just as he’d started it – in third place. His final day bag, weighing 12-5, gave him 44-3 over three days – which was almost a day’s worth of fishing to catch up to VanDam, as things turned out.
Russ Lane’s herculean effort on the final day assured him a fourth-place finish, but unfortunately wasn’t enough to seal the deal on his home water. His 18-1 on Sunday pushed his combined total weight to 43-12 – a solid keeper away from his first Classic title.
Kansas angler Brent Chapman snuck into fifth place, thanks to a strong final day showing of 16-12, giving him a three-day combined total weight of 37-14, and after laying everything on the line Sunday, Mike Iaconelli was forced to settle for sixth place with 37-5 in combined weight, after bringing in 10-9 to the Civic Center on Sunday.
1st Place: Kevin VanDam
Prior to this week, Kevin VanDam had already notched two Classic titles, five Toyota Tundra Angler of the Year titles, and 14 BASS victories. One might think that VanDam’s desire to win would be dimming. That couldn’t be further from the truth.
In fact, if anything, the 42-year-old angler, who’s been fishing BASS events for over half his life wants to win more than ever. Winning this week was special, even despite all the previous accolades. “This is what I love to do – I love the competition, and I love the people that I get to be around,” he said.
“I can tell you that I’m worn completely out right now. I was fortunate to have a lot of my family here this week, which made it really special. Believe me, this means everything to win a Bassmaster Classic – it’s what everyone who ever enters a tournament dreams of.”
Pattern:
VanDam fished the same creek during practice in 2007, and he discovered the abundance of habitat bass could shelter in when the water was cold. “What happened in that tournament was it got warmer a lot faster than it did this week, and the fish really spread out,” he said.
“Most of the fish in that tournament were caught
where Todd (Faircloth) and Jeff (Kriet) were fishing.”
VanDam pointed out that Beeswax Creek also had some of the warmest water on the lake, and as a result the shad kill wasn’t as pronounced. “The fish were a little more active because it was warmer, and there wasn’t as much food in the water, which obviously helped,” he said.
“Also, each day that it warmed more fish moved into the creek. The area that I focused on has a good population of resident fish too, so it was always replenishing.”
It’s been talked about all week that Beeswax creek was the epicenter of most of the action. But unlike those fishing out closer to the main lake, who were inundated with traffic throughout the week, VanDam was unmolested in an area nearer to the launch site.
“The area of Beeswax that I went to, I didn’t have any other competitors,” he said. “Takahiro (Omori) came in the first day, but I’d already caught 99% of what I weighed in.”
VanDam noted that reason he didn’t have any competitors around was mainly due to the fact that they didn’t realize the potential the small area had. “I can guarantee you if they would’ve know the potential of the spot, they would’ve been in there,” he said.
“I threw back three bags over 10 pounds over the course of the week, so it was a really special area.”
The key to VanDam’s triumph was in his targeting of key pieces of cover along the edge of the flat he was fishing. “I had one stump out there that I caught seven keepers on,” he said.
“My whole deal was that I would just go around the area targeting the stumps and indentions. One past through it would allow my starting spot to rest for 20 minutes or so, and I would do that all day.”
On the final day, while his near-20-pound stringer may suggest otherwise, VanDam said that it was a real grind. “The thing that gave me confidence was that the first bite I had this morning was a five-pounder,” he said.
“Yesterday I caught quite a few fish, but they were all small. When the lake stabilized overnight, the water temperature came up too. I knew right then it was going to be a special day.”
Winning Bait: ½ Strike King Red Eye Shad in either Gold or Gold Sexy Shad all equipped with #2 Mustad hooks
Winning Gear: Signature series Quantum Cranking Rods, and signature series Quantum reel.
Key Factor to the Win: “I went into every single creek on this lake during practice. This biggest factor in allowing me decipher the area that I was really looking for was my Hummingbird Side Imaging unit. It’s the greatest technological advance that I’ve seen in my career.”
2nd Place: Jeff Kriet
It’s a hard pill to swallow being as close to winning the Bassmaster Classic as Jeff Kriet was, so it’s understandable that his enthusiasm wasn’t very high. “What do you
do?” he asked. “I went out there knowing that everyone behind me was really good, and really felt like I had to have my best day of the week.
“I’ll be honest with you…I’d like to be able to talk a little trash right now rather than to sit here and talk about being in second place.”
Prior to official practice, Kriet, who is one of the field’s best cold-weather fishermen, explained that he’d planned on coming to Lay and fishing deep. “It’s probably a good thing that it turned off muddy because that got me off the deep deal,” he said.
“I thought before we even got down here that the conditions were right for me to be in the thick of things.”
With everyone in Beeswax throwing lipless crankbaits for three consecutive days, Kriet’s fishing subconscious alerted him in the middle of the night that he needed to change presentations. “I had vision last night that I needed to be throwing a Speed Worm, or something like that,” he said.
“I get those visions a lot, and they’re never right, so I didn’t run out at 2:00 in the morning and get any. I was able to find something pretty close in the bottom of my tackle bag, and tied it on but never got a fish on it. That’s usually how my visions turn out.”
Within everyone in the Super Six fishing in Beeswax at one point or another during the week, Kriet explained that the overheard excitement from a nearby angler would key him in on an upcoming bite.
“They bit in spurts, so you’d hear someone hoot and holler across the creek, and know that they were fixing to start biting,” he said. “The only problem with that was that if I heard Todd’s spectators start clapping, I’d be thinking, ‘Oh…that’s going to hurt’.”
After leaning on his area pretty hard the first two days of the tournament, Kriet pointed out that its potential was proven by the fact that he was able to sack over 14 pounds of bass on Sunday. “There’s no shame in catching 14 pounds this week,” he said.
“I know that the area had some big fish in it because I had the bites in practice, and lost a few of them over the week. They just never showed up and bit right during the tournament.”
When asked if there’s anything he would change, Kriet allowed that he would’ve preferred for VanDam to not have caught them quite so good today. However, in reality, he admitted that he fished exactly the way that he thought he needed to in order to win. “I’ve asked myself that already,” he said.
“The deal is that we were all fishing essentially the same stretch of water, and I laid claim to what I thought was the best stretch in there.”
While extreme disappointment may not be enough to describe Jeff Kriet’s emotions immediately following Sunday’s weigh-in, he did point out that he fished without regret. “I fished as clean a tournament as I’ve ever fished,” he said.
“It would’ve been easy for me to get spun out this morning when I hadn’t caught a fish and could hear everyone around me clapping for VanDam. I just really felt like if it was my time to win, I’d win. There’s no doubt that if I keep getting this close, I’ll win one of these things.”
3rd Place: Todd Faircloth
Todd Faircloth put together a super-strong challenge for the bass-behemoth that is Kevin VanDam this week. Ultimately, it wasn’t enough to pull off the upset, but as Todd pointed out, there are few regrets in his performance this week.
“It was a good showing, but it’s not where I wanted to finish,” he said. “I really felt like I had a legitimate shot at winning this thing. I fished a clean tournament and didn’t lose any fish, I just never got a big bite today.”
In the end, Todd explained that he just ran out of fish. “I’d just beat them up too bad,” he said. “I thought I had a back-up deal, but they’d already been beat to death too. One of these days one of my back-up deals that I have tucked away will work out.”
His “back-up deal” was an area that he’d fished early on the first morning. “I thought that they might be on in there with the way the conditions were,” he said. “Shad was a big factor in that place, and I didn’t see any whatsoever.
“It was a bad decision to have left, but when I came back into (Beeswax) I was able to catch a limit pretty quick.”
With the level of competition that the Classic brings, Faircloth said that it’s almost impossible to string three consistent days together in order to pull out a win. “It’s a struggle out there to put three good days together,” he said.
“That’s the only way you’re going to win out here, but it’s almost impossible to do it.”
Ultimately, regardless of the disappointment, Todd pointed out that it does not good to second-guess yourself. “You can knit-pick every single decision that you made all week long, but it’s not going to do any good,” he said.
“I’m going to put this one away and go swing at ‘em again in a couple weeks at Clear Lake.”
4th Place: Russ Lane
Russ Lane came to Lay Lake this week with redemption on his mind after his disappointing finish in 2007. His near-19-pound bag on the final day not only made for great television, but it also cemented his belief that he’s able to compete on the sport’s biggest stage.
His plan to have ultimate redemption at Lay Lake was undone, as Lane pointed out, Saturday. “I only weighed four fish, which really hurt me in the end,” he said. “I had a couple of decent ones on during the day that would’ve allowed me to make up some ground – at least get closer anyway.”
Lane said that his game plan for the week was to stick it out in Beeswax throwing a lipless crankbait with everyone else through Saturday. If he could stay within striking distance of the leaders, he felt sure that the flipping bite would push him over the
top when conditions warranted.
“I hung around in there and beat on ‘em with everyone else as long as I could stand to,” he said. “I would go everyday to big-fish areas that I have history on hoping to get a few bites, but would always wind up back in (Beeswax).”
In a hole at the start of Championship Sunday, Lane gambled by abandoning Beeswax Creek in search of big bites. “Actually, everything worked out today just as I’d planned it,” he said. “Last week I planned that Spring Creek would turn on today, so I went in there all three days of the tournament,” he said. “I never got a bite in there until today, and it was just crazy once they got fired up.”
Last year, Lane admits to letting the Classic experience get in his head and, as a result, off his game. Still, he pointed out that he’s unable to get away from his vast history on Lay Lake. “There was year that I fished 70 tournaments in one year on the Coosa chain,” he said.
“That’s how I knew a week ago what was going to happen today in Spring Creek.”
Hardly content with a fourth-place finish, Lane explained that he’s proud to have been able to be competitive at his home lake. “I had a blast this week, and really can’t say anything bad about the experience,” he said.
“It’s nice to be home and get to see people that I’ve fished with at the club level out here watching me fish the Classic.”
5th Place: Brent Chapman
While it’s not a win, the fifth-place finish that Brent Chapman posted this week in Birmingham has him excited about the upcoming season nonetheless. “That’s the thing about this sport: you’re always learning, and you’re always growing,” he said. “This is what I needed to jump-start the year.”
Chapman stormed into the Super Six after a less-than-stellar second day by bringing one of the heavier limits of the tournament to the scales. “I wish I could go back and re-live (Saturday) knowing what I know now,” he said.
“It just shows you how close you can be to figuring out the subtleties from one day to the next.”
Chapman, like everyone else, spent the majority of his time inside Beeswax Creek “keeping things simple” and not overcomplicating matters. “With everyone in there pounding on them, it would’ve been easy to think that you need to be doing something off-the-wall,” he said.
“I just tried to keep it basic and not over-think things so I pretty much stuck with what was working – a lipless crankbait, just like everyone else.”
On his performance this week, Chapman explained that he has no regrets. If anything, his finish has only fueled his fire. “It’s got me fired up,” he said. “I only hope that I can keep it up for the entire season and have a shot at being up here again in 2011.”
6th Place: Michael Iaconelli
After winning the 2003 Classic in New Orleans, Mike Iaconelli has become a stable at the top of the Sunday’s leader board. His “Never Give Up!” mantra has become a fixture in our bass-fishing lingo, and it’s apparent by his performance at Lay Lake this week that he lives what he preaches.
“I started the week knowing that I would be in the mix, I just wasn’t entirely sure how,” he said. “Having that confidence really allowed me to be a lot more free with everything because I wasn’t tied to a specific area or pattern.”
One key was to go against the grain by now camping out in Beeswax. “Moving around this week was definitely a key for me,” he said. “Had I just settled in one area, I wouldn’t be sitting here now.
“I was really playing clean up in Beeswax because I never staked out a specific area. As a result, I really had to keep moving around on a milk-run that I’d established.”
The other key was his “panic box” that found its way onto his Basscat’s casting deck early Friday morning, and never left. His bait of choice was an old grub dressed with and inline spinner. “Everyone was throwing the vibration baits and rattling baits,” he said.
“In practice, I pulled out the grub and got a lot of bites on it. It turned out to be my key bait this week.”
Ike explained that the allure of the grub was in its subtleness amid the clutter of vibrating baits bass around Lay had grown accustomed to hearing. “They hear so many rattles that every once in a while you can get them to bite a lot better with something that’s more subtle,” he explained.
“Plus, when it’s cold like this, they’ll sometimes eat a grub better than anything else. All of my big fish this week came on the grub…really, about 60% of my weight came on it.”
Looking back on ending the week in sixth place as opposed to first, Ike explained that he has no regrets. “It’s not eating at me at all,” he said. “I’ve won the Classic and Angler of the Year titles, and I’m fishing better now that I’ve ever fished before.
“That’s what I’m focusing on, and although I haven’t been able to win a big one in a few years, if I keep fishing smart I will.”
Here's what some of the other anglers had to say about the final Classic day:
Matt Herren (7th Place)
“The water generation schedule was really funky this week. I love to flip and pitch and that bite just never happened. I fought, scratched, and clawed to do as well as I did this week and just couldn’t quite put things together. I’m a little disappointed but I did all that I could do. It just didn’t set up for me this week.”
Jeff Freeman (9th Place)
“Today was my best day. I probably only caught nine or 10 keepers but I had some good ones. I was probably 400 yards from Kevin VanDam and there were some other competitors close to me but they were all throwing traps. I took a worm and slowed down and force fed them.”
Mark Tucker (12th Place)
“It was tough again today and I had to force feed them. I’d like to be here next week after a few warm nights. The water is trying to warm up a little but it’s just been tough for me.
“I stayed on the bluffs and fished a jig and really thought that I could catch them. You just had to put it in front of one to get it to eat. Today, I threw to one tree at least 40 time and caught two fish that were 3 ½ pounds each.”
Cliff Crochet (13th Place)
“I finished my limit at 9:30 today and the fish that I was on were all the same size. After I had my limit, I went out junk fishing. I just never got a big bite all week. Overall, this was a great experience. It was a dream come true to fish in the Classic.”
Bobby Lane (15th Place)
“I was fortunate yesterday to come in with 12 pounds. I knew that I needed to make some adjustments to catch some bigger fish and you really need to do that in a tournament like this. I gave myself a shot at least and tried to duplicate what I did yesterday.”
Kota Kiriyama (16th Place)
“It got tougher for me every day but I had to slow down even more today to catch my five fish. I threw a Flick Shake all week in the clear and warmer water. I knew the fish were there. If the temperature was a little higher, I would have stayed in the main river. There was a lot of pressure in my area so I really had to finesse fish.”
Gerald Swindle (20th Place)
“I feel like if this thing continued I could steadily peck away with seven pound limits for the rest of my life. I wasn’t even close. I feel like I’ve been boxing and octopus because I got hit in the head from every different angle and I really didn’t know what I could do differently.”
