Bass Digest/April, 2014
Have you had any close calls? Boat accidents or near misses, hippo’s, crocs, snakes, etc.?
Snakes. Fishing Rust de Winter, Daniel Brown and Jarred were fishing opposite me in the one section. I was focussed, and I missed a bite. I then heard them calling but I was too focused on catching this fish I just lost. Anyway they kept calling and I realised the fish was gone, so as I looked back and saw this huge snake right by my boat. It looked like a mamba or something. It was huge.
And then a croc at Rusties popped up right next to my boat. It was cheeky and I thought it was going to jump on my boat. Luckily I have a push pole so I pushed it away.
Then I had a boat accident in 2011, 2 days before the Nationals at Clanwilliam in the Cape. I flew back up to JHB to fish the BETT at Witbank. I borrowed a friend’s boat - a Terminator with a V-Max on the back. We launched and were boat number 3. Just before the first turn in the gorge, I hit a little wake – ok well, you can’t even call it a little wake, it wasn’t even something that you would usually slow down for - I was trimmed down and doing about 93km/h at the time. Everything was perfect at that moment, and then all of a sudden the boat just got “stuck” in that wake (I don’t know how else to describe it). Well, the boat went from 93km/h to a dead stop, and the two of us just kept going! It all happened in a split second and was scary how quickly it happened. It was the beginning of August; the water was 9° so it was a cold shock. Man, the kill-switch really saved us that day!
Who’s your favourite BASSMASTER personality and why?
I like KVD. I'm not that up to date with the newer guys, but KVD has achieved so much and it’s also just the way he approaches everything. He’s a really hard worker and is proof that what you put in, is what you get out.