Okeechobee FLW winner Pat Fisher has been fishing well for more than a year now, which is one reason he's worked himself up to being ranked 19th in the world. Since skill levels are pretty much even across all tour pros, a win or high finish often boils down to two factors: mental discipline and finding winning fish. Recently, he talked to BassFan about the latter.
Starts in Practice
"The first thing is practice," Fisher said. "I allow myself at lest a week of practice to try to cover as much of the lake as I can.
"While I'm practicing I do get bites, and early in the week I do set the hook to see what size they are. But I allow myself 3 days prior to the tournament where I don't set the hook."
For the first 4 days of practice, "I'm trying to find a group of fish," he said. "So when I practice, I practice really fast, like Kevin VanDam. I cover a lot of water."
His goal is to get 3-4 keeper bites in an area. "If I do that, I know I can catch them during the tournament. And if I slow down, I probably can get 8 bites."
Then he tries to find similar areas, otherwise known as pattern-fishing. "I figure out why they're holding there, what they're holding on -- wood, rock or grass -- and try to duplicate that around the lake. That way instead of having one spot where if I slow down I'll get 8 bites, I might have 3-4."
On the 3 practice days he doesn't set the hook, he goes back to the areas he found and "slows down. I'm seeing if they're there and I can get my 8 bites. Sometimes I'll throw a totally different bait to see if they like something a little better."
Okeechobee Example
"At Okeechobee, before the EverStart, the conditions were warm so I knew the fish would be chasing baits. I went out in practice and found a particular type of grass they were in.
"It seemed like the only time I was getting bit was in pencil reeds with no lily pads, so I started searching the lake for those types of areas. I found three, and all three were loaded with fish -- big fish, too, 3-5 pounders."
He had the fish, but finished low at the EverStart. "The conditions changed, and the fish weren't chasing anymore. That's what hurt me. I didn't figure out how to catch them while it was cold."
In the 2 weeks between the EverStart and the FLW, "it seemed like every 4 days a cold front came through. On the warm days I did the same thing (throwing a Zoom Speed Worm and a spoon). When the cold fronts came, I flipped a (Zoom) Critter Craw and had some really big bites.
"I stayed in the same areas because I knew the fish were there. I just didn't figure out where they went in the EverStart. But I was told the bass will go to the thickest cover they can find, and 50 yards away from those spawning areas with pencil reeds were hyacinth mats."
Tournament Questions
Fisher added that he's always on the lookout for bigger bass, but in competition will catch a limit first if he has a choice. Let's look at that a little more closely.
> What if he's getting 2-pound bites and knows the lake has a 2-pound average? "I'll go and try to catch my 2-pound average if it comes easily, then go for a kicker fish. To win, you know you need that kicker fish every day. If the average is 10 pounds a day, you need 12 pounds a day. You have to be better than the average. Sometimes the average will get you there, but most times it won't."
> What if you have 4 fish weighing 8 pounds on the afternoon of day 1? "I'll go for my fifth 2-pound fish because if you fall behind in one of these tournaments, it's so hard to catch up."
A final note: "The conditions and everything obviously play a huge part in it," Fisher said.
