Tournament #1 of the FLW Rayovac Texas division, Lake Amistad
I arrived at Lake Amistad for practice on Friday February 6th for 6 days of practice before the tournament. I went to a marine shop to have my motor looked at (stuck thermostat from a piece of wood I hit) and the tech that was working on my motor asked me if I had been on the lake yet. I replied no. He grinned at me and said "it has been real tough". I optimistically thought to myself "that is ok, Ill figure it out. Well after 6 days of practice I had 2 bites and 1 fish landed. Pretty hard to have confidence in any of the numerous spots I fished with no bites and production. However the last evening before the tournament started my practice partner landed one really good fish in a spot we knew had to hold fish. The first day of the tournament a big weather change came. Yep dropped into the low 50's, 20-25 MPH wind and rain. While this made for an extremely intense take off and boat ride on my first ever tournament morning it also turned the fishing up a notch. I caught 6 fish on a Carolina Rig within 2 hours of getting to my spot. 4 of the six were short and I could not keep. 2 of the fish I caught I made a huge mistake and released even though they would have kept. (I had the size limit wrong in my head. I thought they had to be 15". 14" was the limit) I never quite got over culling two keepers that would have put me higher up the list on day 1. Instead I brought nothing to the weigh in. Day 2 I was able to weigh two keepers and at least get 100th place and 151 valuable FLW angler points. All in all a successful first tournament! I know I can do better!
