Although numerous bigger limits were weighed in by anglers throughout the week at Lake Okeechobee, no one could match the consistency of Rob Branagh of Malabar, Florida. Branagh brought a final-day total of five bass weighing 19 pounds, 11 ounces to the scale Saturday to win the season-opening Toyota Series event at Lake Okeechobee.
Branagh’s three-day total of 15 bass weighing 51-05 earned him the win by a 9-ounce margin over 2nd-place Nicholas Hoinig of Port Saint Lucie, Florida, and earned Branagh the top payout of $66,500 in the first tournament of the 2022 Toyota Series Southern Division.
“I knew I could catch a 12-to-15-pound limit every day, and I figured that would be okay on Day 1, but on Day 2 I thought I was going to get smoked by the guys that were bed fishing, because those fish were coming in,” said Branagh, who earned his first career victory in MLF competition. “But I wasn’t going to bank on that. It was a gamble, and I made the right gamble at the right time. I just fished where there was a bunch of fish and hoped I could get the right bites, and this morning I did.”
Branagh said that he fished on the south end of the lake, near Rita Island. He targeted clean water, keying in on underwater cattail stops with a Texas-rigged Netbait Big Bopper.
“It was a muck bottom,” Branagh said. “I used a 1/8-ounce weight so I could roll it slow. My plan was to catch five baits on the Big Bopper and then switch to a bigger bait to catch bigger fish, but the fish just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger on that Bopper, so I never put it down all weekend.”
When asked what he planned to do with his winnings, Branagh said that he plans to help his daughter.
“My daughter has two kids and works her butt off. I’m so proud of her, I’m probably going to buy her a car."
Here are the final totals for the Top 10:
1. Rob Branagh: 51-05
2. Nicholas Hoinig: 50-12
3. Lance Pemble: 50-06
4. Chris McBeath: 49-06
5. Brandon Medlock: 48-10
6. Lee Stalvey: 48-10
7. Bryan Honnerlaw: 47-10
8. Frank Kitchens III: 47-08
9. Willy Dennison: 47-04
10. Terry Olinger: 47-01
