PHOTO BY PHOENIX MOORE
Bobby Lane ’ s decision to fish shallow creeks helped secure his victory at REDCREST .
here are very few people who can identify to the second when their professional career ( and life , for that matter ) dramatically changed for the better . Not so for Bobby Lane . At precisely 3:46:45 p . m . CT on March 27 , 2022 , a Brecknell Electrosamson digital scale in the hands of MLF official Paul Brown settled on the number “ 2.0 ” – 2 pounds , 0 ounces – the minimum scorable weight for a Grand Lake , Oklahoma , bass to count in the Championship Round of Bass Pro Shops REDCREST 2022 Presented by Costa . Lane ’ s life changed at that moment .
Although he would have to wait another 3 minutes and 15 seconds for the buzzer to sound on the final period and another agonizing 65 seconds after lines out before MLF Assistant Tournament Manager Mike Jinkins officially confirmed that SCORETRACK- ER ® was finalized and that Lane was the REDCREST champion by 1 pound , 3 ounces , the Florida pro ’ s lifetime moment of truth came at 3:46:45 on March 27 .
Here ’ s how he arrived at that moment …
THE LEADUP — MARCH 17 – 22
The journey from Lane ’ s home in Lakeland , Florida , to the shores of Grand Lake O ’ the Cherokees in Grove , Oklahoma , is a long one : roughly 1,235 miles , which it takes a solid 18 or 19 hours to traverse . The trip winds through Georgia , Alabama , Mississippi and Arkansas , and as he and son Bobby III made the three-day drive , Lane was already in information-gathering mode . “ Driving through Mississippi and Arkansas before we got to Grand Lake , I told my son ‘ We need to look for little buddies ,’” Lane said . “ That ’ s what we call the first buds you start to see on trees in the spring ; they ’ re our ‘ little buddies ’. The dogwoods were already starting to bloom at that time , but the further we got out there toward
Oklahoma , the more we started to see the buds on all the bigger trees .
“ That told me that it had probably been warm enough for a week or two for fish to start their prespawn migration to being up shallow and catchable on a shallow crankbait . I knew before I even got there that I wanted to throw a Berkley Frittside , a big spinnerbait and a jig . The more I saw the ‘ buddies ,’ the more confidence I got that this could be a decent tournament for me .”
Lane was so confident in what the little buddies were telling him that he showed up for the first day of RED- CREST practice in shorts and a dry-fit t-shirt , prepared to run nothing but early prespawn patterns . By noon he hadn ’ t gotten a single bite cranking bridges and primary points . He moved a little shallower and was quickly rewarded with his first fish , and then picked up several more bites as he moved further back into Honey Creek , eventually finishing his day catching fish along the face of a wall in less than 6 feet of water .
JUNE-JULY 2022 | MAJORLEAGUEFISHING . COM 35