Bass Digest: What do you consider to be your primary fishing strengths and weaknesses on the water?
Martin de Kock: I take pride in being a versatile angler and am confident and competitive with all techniques when conditions and circumstance requires. My preference is however “powerfishing” with crankbaits, spinnerbaits and topsurface lures. When I started competitive fishing, I was often too impatient. With experience my confidence and “mental strength” grew. Mental strength and an angler’s ability to find fish consistently is what differentiates an average angler from a good one. All the good anglers I know have an excellent “eye for structure”. In other words, they can determine where fish should be located before even casting their lure
Bass Digest: Do you use your fish finder to find spots to fish? Do you just know where to look for the fish? How do you go about choosing your fishing spots?
Martin de Kock: Being efficient with one’s electronics is an integral part of being a competent angler. Effective use of Sonar GPS and sidescan should be a given. I use 2 Lowrance HDs 5 units, which are relatively small, but for my requirements are perfect. To consistently catch fish on offshore structure, understanding of bottom composition, how to locate and pinpoint certain characteristics and in which way fish relate to them at different times of the year, is critical. There are also certain signs of nature that will determine the productivity of an area. Baitfish is critical – find the bait and the bass is seldom far off. Always keep a sharp lookout for predatory birds, baitfish activity and feeding bass
Bass Digest: Being such an accomplished angler already, where to from here for you? What are your aspirations & goals for the future?
Martin de Kock: I am fortunate that my wife and family support my passion for fishing. Therefore I fish at least 3 times a month. Nowadays I focus on
00000000000000000000 experimenting with different 00000000000000000000lures and simply recreational 00000000000000000000angling. As mentioned, I also 00000000000000000000participate on the Y-Bass 00000000000000000000circuit to satisfy my 00000000000000000000competitive needs
Bass Digest: “What happens on tour stays on tour” but at Bass Digest we like to tell all. What is your funniest moment you can recall on tour?
Martin de Kock: At the 2010 Zone six tournament held at Clanwilliam Dam, Dean Searl (my Protea boat partner), got so excited in culling large smallmouth that he dropped the handscale with a fish into the livewell. After an extensive search it was re-located. Naturally Dean had no recollection of the incident. Unfortunately the scale did not survive the abuse.
It belonged to Chalky White and he did not receive the news well later that afternoon. What further complicated the issue was that Dean also cracked the boat’s windscreen on the same day by accident. As the boat also belonged to Chalky it was a double whammy
Bass Digest: What advice do you have for young aspiring bass anglers that hope to achieve the level of fishing you have?
Martin de Kock: A lot of info can now be sourced of the Internet. Information that took years for the “old school” guys to source is now readily available on the net. Do not get overconfident with early success and handle it with poise
Bass Digest: Martin, thank you for your time and we look forward to keeping track of your future bassing achievements
Martin de Kock: Thank you
Represented S.A. in 7 Internal Tests
Member of the Protea Team from 2004-2010
Bass Federaton Nation Alabama S.A. Representative
Currently Fishing Y-Bass
Bass Digest/June, 2014