THE TOURNAMENT REPORT |
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PHOTO BY GARRICK DIXON PHOTO BY ROB MATSUURA |
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PHOTO BY GARRICK DIXON
PHOTO BY GARRICK DIXON
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1 . WILEY X SUMMIT CUP PRESENTED BY B & W TRAILER HITCHES Lake Murray May 15-Jun 19 |
If you were to hand-pick a lineup of Carolina hammers to win a bass tournament on Lake Murray , your All-Star team darn sure better include Marty Robinson . The South Carolina pro has collected four MLF wins and multiple Top 10s in his home state , and when the Summit Cup field arrived at a heavily stained , stingy Lake Murray for the first of five rain-soaked days of competition , Robinson became an instant favorite .
Robinson caught his biggest fish of the week — a 6-pounder — in his first Elimination Round , slipped through the Sudden Death Rounds and then connected with 22-15 on 11 fish in the final round to outdistance Bryan Thrift by 5 pounds .
Robinson mixed it up with a 1 / 2- ounce Buckeye Lures jig and flatsided crankbait , covering as much water as possible in the Big Saluda arm of Lake Murray . The win was Robinson ’ s first in an MLF Cup .
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2 . BASS PRO TOUR FAVORITE FISHING STAGE THREE PRESENTED BY BASS CAT BOATS Harris Chain of Lakes May 21-26
To say Bass Pro Tour angler Ott DeFoe is “ on a hot streak ” would be an egregious understatement . Heading into the third tournament of the 2021 BPT regular-season schedule — on the Harris Chain of Lakes in central Florida — the Tennessee pro had logged two Bass Pro Tour wins and an MLF Cup victory in the previous 18 months ( including a win at Sam Rayburn just two months prior ).
So when DeFoe went to work on a series of docks on Lake Harris with a prototype Terminator swim jig and a Rapala OG Slim crankbait in the Championship Round of Stage Three , it should ’ ve come as no surprise that he would end the day with 27 pounds more than the nearest competitor . DeFoe caught 30 scorable largemouth for 73 pounds , 14 ounces to Bobby Lane ’ s 46-13 and Brent Chapman ’ s 45-7 , one of the largest margins if victory in MLF history .
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The win put DeFoe in the driver ’ s seat for the 2021 Bass Pro Tour Angler of the Year award , and set the stage for a good old-fashioned donnybrook with Jacob Wheeler and Brent Ehrler over the second half of the BPT season . |
3 . PHOENIX BASS FISHING LEAGUE PRESENTED BY T-H MARINE ALL-AMERICAN Douglas Lake presented by TINCUP Whiskey June 3 – 5
Brant Grimm secured his place in the history books with his win in the 2021 All-American , and he did so fishing his home waters of Douglas Lake in eastern Tennessee .
Grimm , a general contractor , lives less than an hour from both Cherokee and Douglas lakes . He qualified for the All-American on Cherokee before setting his sights on a tremendous fishery in Douglas Lake that was fishing a little stingy by the time the grassroots championship rolled around .
While much of the field was spending most of its time up shallow — a stark contrast to how
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many summertime tournaments are often won on the mountain reservoir — Grimm was upriver fishing offshore drop-offs near main-river channel swings with a Strike King 6XD , which allowed him to weigh in 46-9 over three days for the $ 100,000 check and title of All- American champion .
4 . BASS PRO TOUR B & W TRAILER HITCHES STAGE FOUR PRESENTED BY ATG X WRANGLER Lake Chickamauga June 4-9
If there ’ s a better tournament resume on the Tennessee River than Kevin VanDam ’ s , we have yet to see it . And thanks in part to a 30- minute fish-catching blitzkrieg in the final period of Stage Four on Lake Chickamauga , the G . O . A . T . can add “ Bass Pro Tour Champion ” to his resume .
VanDam entered the tournament with a great deal of confidence ( and , admittedly , a chip on his shoulder after failing to capitalize on what he considered a can ’ t- miss winning pattern on Sam
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