In our annual three club two-day tournament at Lake Martin last weekend, 27 members weighed in 244 bass weighing about 357 pounds. We had 26 five-fish limits on Saturday and 21 limits on Sunday. There was one zero for both days. There were only 36 largemouth.

Lee Hancock won with 10 bass weighing 21.96 pounds and had big fish with a 4.38 pound largemouth. Doug Acree was second with ten at 19.87 pounds, Tom Tanner placed third with ten weighing 18.04 pounds and Kwong Yu was fourth with ten at 17.94.

We pay out the top four and big fish each day based on that day’s catch. Saturday, Tom Tanner won with 11.10 pounds, Kwong Yu was second with 10.94, Raymond English was third with 10.76, Lee Hancock was fourth with 10.36 and I came in fifth with 10.0. Raymond English had big fish with a 3.33 pounder.

Sunday Lee Hancock won with 11.60 pounds, Doug Acree had 9.97 for second, third was William Scott with 9.33 and his partner Dylan Lawrence was fourth with 8.95. Tom Tanner placed fifth with 8.77. Lee Hancock had big fish with his 4.38 pounder and was the only fisherman to win money both days.

I went over Wednesday in the pouring rain and set up camp at Wind Creek State Park. Thursday, I tried a few things and thought I had a pattern of decent size spots on deep rocky points. I caught my biggest fish, a 2.5-pound spot, from a blowdown so I hoped that was a back-up plan. But I did not catch fish in the tournament on either!

Friday, I got up before daylight and thought I had found some fish on a shallow point at first light. I didn’t fish much, deciding to come in and rest.

Saturday, I caught two decent spots on my first stop. Then I spent the next six hours catching small fish on the two patterns from Thursday that I knew I did not want to weigh in. I needed bigger fish.

At 2:00 I cast a jig under a dock and caught a bigger spot, about 2.5 pounds, so I started fishing docks. I soon caught another 2.5 pound spot, then landed a 2.63 pound largemouth, under other docks, before 3:00. Although I fished docks hard for the last two hours I did not catch another keeper.

Sunday I again caught two fish on my first stop, but they were small spots I hoped to cull. So, I started fishing docks but could catch only small spots. I had a limit at 9:00 but they were small and my best five weighted in only 6.25 pounds.

At noon I decided to try other things and caught as few small spots. I probably should have stuck with docks since the fish started hitting around them after lunch the day before. As usual, I wish I could go back and do something else.

I love Lake Martin and camping at Wind Creek. On my first trip there in 1975 I caught my first spotted bass ever. And we usually catch a lot of fish, as all the limits in the tournament show. It is a fun place to fish and the bass bite good all fall.