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7 pounder Anchors Win for Carter/Whiteside at East Lake

 Our second tournament of 2011/12 was held at East Lake Toho, November 19^th. As usual, we launched in St. Cloud and everybody was stoked for catching a bunch of bass. Most participants had sampled the lake in the days leading up to the tournament and had caught enough to ramp up their optimism. I fished an event the previous Saturday and had 15 lb, pretty good for East Lake, Brent/Matt did well on Thursday, the Rushings had a good practice day. The usual patterns were holding up. Find the right patch of pepper grass and land them early. We had a bit of an East wind to start the day and it increased to close to 15 , but the lake was certainly fishable. Later in the day clouds came in , which should have improved the bite but most teams did their best early.

Our fearless leader Ben Carter and his new partner/long time member Glenn Whiteside teamed up for the best stringer of the day, 18.84. Anchored (and I say anchored because the pair WAS anchored for the better part of the day) by an East Lake giant, a 7.25 lber. Glenn caught that beauty on a spinnerbait after the team moved out in a bit deeper water. They ran to the West side of the lake and stayed in the grass all day. Their fish were caught on Carolina rigs and spinnerbaits.

Tom Burk/Nate Bloom ran to the West side early in the day, also and threw swimbaits around the grass patches. They had a nice limit early and finished off their Second place bag with a 4 pound fish from Ajay on a spinnerbait. Their 5 weighted 16.41. Their practice day was poor, but their faith that the 7-9 ft water held nice fish paid off. Nate did catch a final cull fish, shallow on a fluke late in the day.

Rich Kronopka/Kurt Diesing paired up this year and were rewarded with a Third place finish, 14.04 lb. They mostly fished the West side, threw spinnerbaits and culled all day. They moved back to their best location, about ¼ mile from Ben/Glenn around 2 pm. And culled 3 fish to up their total. Rich has scored well in our last few East Lake derbies in this same general area.

NOTES: Ronnie Jackson said he had a 10+ fish in practice and tried to get it Saturday. Only problem was Bo Jones got to the fish first , hooked it and it came unbuttoned…….Lots of limits, good turnout, lots of Toys for Tots…….Hats off to Ben, he had a $100 bonus to the winner if the team wore Santa hats all day..he left his hat at home and the prize went unclaimed….Chip Dover’s 7.79 lb fish at Kissimmee last month won the Bass Club Side Pot award….Trail member Danny Lanier wasn’t at the East Lake tournament, but the previous week he teamed with John Kremer and won a 19 ft Skeeter…..I hear they are looking to sell it if anyone is interested………..See ya’ on the River

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