Great Team Weekend

August 16-17 The New York State B.A.S.S. Chapter Federation held the 2day CTC tournament on the St. Lawrence River - Ogdensburg, NY this weekend. The format of this tournament is at event. 20 teams from across NY State and NJ competed in 6-man teams against each other in a total team weight event. Each team is comprised of 3 boaters and 3 non-boaters which get paired with a member from another club they are competing against on the water. The day is split. Half the day the boater is in charge of location and fishing style and the front of the boat, while the other half of the day the non-boater gets to choose location and has the right to take the front deck area to fish. The style of tournament takes time management, strategy management, and emphasizes the need of communication between competitors paid together for the day. I was a boater for the Northern New York Bassmasters team in the competition. Day 1 and Day were totally different weather days and weights fluctuated all over the field. Day 1: Weather-Rain, Cloudy, High winds 15-17 SW MPH. I hear a tournament was actually canceled down river near Cornwall due to the weather. The field took off at 6:00 am and anglers saw a variety of weather conditions during the day depending which direction they chose to travel. The anglers heading east said the waves were manageable while anglers that took off in the westerly direction reported 4-5 footers from Clayton to the Brockville Narrows. The fishing was a slow grind. I started shallow to see if the cloud cover and wind had them up on the shoals feeding but after an hour I only had one, albeit a 4 lber. Caught on a spinnerbait. I switched focus to deep water humps and rock piles. Slowly as each hour passed I would get one, with about an hour in between each one. Each fish was in that 4 lb+ range so even though the fishing was slow, I was getting the quality I was targeting. By 10:40 I had 4 fish all over 4 lbs, 3 from dropshotting and I couldn't find a specific bait they wanted either. I caught one dropshotting an XZone Slammer, one on a Strike King Dream Shot, one on a senko and of course the spinnerbait from earlier. The angler paired with me for the day had 2 fish in the livewell, 1 over 4 and 3.5lbs. He had informed me earlier he wanted to head in the opposite direction than I had traveled so I knew I was running out of time. As the half way time came he informed me that he was happy with our location, since I had us on quality fish and wanted to stay in my areas. I offered him my front deck and we continued to grind out the day until our 3:20 weigh in flight. When we returned to Ogdensburg I had about 20 lbs in the livewell to help my team and the angler paired with me from North Jersey Bassmasters had about 16 lbs on 4 fish! Heck of a day considering weather conditions. I weigh in and officially mark a 19.78 lb bag to help anchor our 6 man team with the day 1 lead over the field. Our team had a little over 96 lbs and a small lead over Rochester Bassmasters nipping at our tails. Day 2- Weather-Sprinkles in the morning, Cloudy, light pure North Wind at 4 MPH. I am paired with another angler for day 2. He is a member of the Adirondack Bassmasters 6 man team. We talk strategy on where I want to go and where he wants to go. We take off. I pull up to our first stop after a 24 minute run and put the trolling motor down. ITS DEAD FROM YESTERDAY! NOTHING Thing can hardly turn. I stay calm. I'm confused. I looked at the 4-bank charger in the boat when I hooked up in the morning to specifically make sure everything was charged for day 2 and everything was green. I check the connections, unplug everything put it back on, check the fuses, etc etc etc....nothing. Everything looks ok. So needless to say, we have no trolling motor and are at the mercy of the wind direction for the day. I make due with what we have and try to block it out of my mind when we get to ledges where I see fish, we catch one and can't hold on them. We did a lot of putting our vests on and driving back up to things as many times as we had to. The fish were biting better this day but the bigger ones were much more elusive. By around noon we both had our limits in the boat. We decided to hit was spot a little further west than I had traveled the day before and it was a good stop. I drop down with a dropshot and quickly upgrade with a 3.7 and 4 lb fish that bump out two 1 lb dinks I was touting around. I figure at this point in time I am somewhere around 17lbs and really need one more big one. My paired angler for the day gets it soon after. A beast football weighing somewhere near 5 lbs caught dropshotting a Tiki Wave worm. We start working our way back to Ogdensburg as today I am in the early flgiht and have to be back at 2:20. We strategically hit spots quickly as we travel back east catching fish but never upgrading. We return to weighin, check in and I weigh in about 17 lbs. Not what I was hoping for but not bad for not having a trolling motor all day. My two day total is: 36.68 lbs. Now I sit and wait for my team to come in. I hope they did well! One of my teammates Doug Kirkbride comes to the scales with a megabag...over 22 lbs! The rest of the team comes in with great respectable weights. We are feeling pretty decent. The NY State B.A.S.S. Chapter announces the results in a small ceremony after some thanks to the Ogdensburg Chamber of Commerce and NY State Senator Patty Richtie. We won! Northern New York Bassmasters takes the field with 196.93 lbs.