(Editor's note: The following is the latest installment in a series of fishing tips presented by The Bass University. Check back each Friday for a new tip.)
You may be an experienced tournament angler with coast-to-coast experience using everything from ultra-finesse to 65-pound braid, but that doesn’t mean you can ever stop learning. Indeed, with increasing intelligent pressure on all of our fisheries ,if you don’t keep developing you may actually see your catches decrease. That’s why so many pros and near-pros depend on the Bass University library to keep their game in peak form. Lots of them do it on the sly, but veteran Oklahoma competitor Bradley Hallman is open about his reliance on this massive resource.
“I’ve been a subscriber for years,” he revealed, and during long drives between tournaments he’ll keep the Bass U programming burning on his phone.
A decade ago, anglers might’ve used cell phones for that same purpose. They’d pass the driving time talking with other anglers about upcoming lakes and likely patterns and conditions. “Everybody’s bouncing stuff off each other,” he said.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t always work out for the best. “None of that ever helps me one bit when it comes down to actual performance in that derby that’s coming up.” a big part of that is because groupthink creates blind spots. Furthermore, as the sharing of information spirals outward, it tends to put anglers in similar places, using similar tactics, for an already stressed fishery.
Therefore, Hallman has turned to Bass U. For example, on an 18-hour drive to the James River, “I can pull up the library and go through everything on fishing tidal rivers.” That includes a healthy dose of experts like Pete Gluszek, Mike Iaconelli and Bryan Schmitt. He knows that they know what they’re talking about and it puts him in the right frame of mind to make both the major and subtle adjustments that lead to success.
“I’m not looking for a whole wealth of information,” he explained. “I’m looking for one little grain of sand … one little thing that I’ve never heard before.”
The reliance on subject matter of experts and geographical experts is what keeps him coming back. He loves flipping, but used the works of JT Kenney to dial in the nuances of Florida-style flipping – heavy braid, snell knots and straight-shank hooks, for example. The result was an FLW Tour victory on Okeechobee. He knows that Bryan New likewise used Kenney’s videos about fishing pads to help dial in his winning Elite Series strategy at the St. Johns River.
Even if you’re not headed to a new body of water, or trying to figure out a new technique, there are videos that apply to anglers everywhere, even those who never leave their home body of water. One of the most popular is Gerald Swindle’s discussion of how “positive mental attitude” makes him a better angler. As Gluszek, said, “Once you get to a certain level, it’s between the ears that separates the guys.”
If you want to get more insight into how Hallman wisely uses his time on the road to perform better in upcoming events, including some of the tidal-water subtleties that he learned from Bass U, check out his full video filmed at the 2021 Bassmaster Classic, available only by subscribing to The Bass University TV.
