I guess that high pitch whistling sound wasn't the wind hitting my Power Poles funny! After a great practice and successful first day on Kentucky Lake I found myself bobbing around in the middle of the lake on day two with a blown air compressor.
I had found an area where there was some beautiful grass and laydowns in practice. It was one of those areas that you don't fish it in practice but only look at it and say to yourself, self I know that there are bass in that grass! Day one of the tournament I decided to roll down to this area and flip the grass for a while. When we pulled up there were bass chasing shad all around the edges of the grass. One thing came to mind. Top water. My co-angler and I worked the grass hard. Kevin had on a spook and I opted for the frog. All of a sudden the morning calm was interrupted by a viscous strike on my co's spook. We spent that morning fishing the grass and laydowns and getting a decent limit of bass. I was in the 40's after day one with plenty of fish and plenty of area to fish.
Day two started out great with a lot of anticipation as to how my grass bass were gonna act that day. They were about a 50 minute run from the takeoff, we headed that way and were involved in a pretty intense race when My motor completely cut out going full tilt. We were dead in the water. After getting a hold of the Mercury Mechanic at the tournament support trailer I was walked through a check on the motor over the phone. He told me to depress a valve and let him know if gas or air came out. Gas oozed out of the air line letting us know we weren't going to be going anywhere. We used the trolling motor to fish some islands and I was able to catch a couple of keepers but it was too little to late. We just could not fish. You learn a lot about people when they are your co-anglers. You learn even more about them when they are your with you in a mechanical breakdown situation. My co-angler that day was a guy named Gary Gustafson. He is a great guy and event though we were both disappointed with the situation he did everything in his power to help with anything that we needed. Thanks Gary you really are a great guy. Next time my motor makes that dreaded sound, I will know to have it looked at well before day 2 of a large tournament!
