BY TAKING SOME CHANCES, BRADLEY DORTCH EARNED
THE TITLE OF FLW TOUR ROOKIE OF THE YEAR
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n June 16, Bradley Dortch took the FLW Tour Rookie
of the Year crown, beating out 29 other rookies for
the title that has passed like a torch among rising
stars. With it came a slot in the Forrest Wood Cup, and when
Dortch hits the water at Lake Murray, he’ll be living a dream
that’s seen the south Alabama contractor bring his family out
of a single-wide trailer and into a full-sized home every bit as
real as his burgeoning FLW career.
How He Got There
CONQUERING FEAR
By Joe Sills
Dortch’s tale is a blue-collar dream, chronicled by a stunning
rise from fishing dollar derbies in a leaky aluminum boat to the
winner’s circle of the FLW Tour. That boat, dubbed the Aluminum
Porpoise, was Dortch’s only way on the water for several years.
“The tape would only last about an hour of running,” he
says of the old 16-foot rig. “Then you’d just run the bilge
pump the whole time.”
FLWFISHING.COM I AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2017