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andy Morgan and Bryan thrift for their consistency , and is trying to pattern his career after theirs . he ’ s already demonstrated his ability to locate offshore fish with lowrance electronics and then catch them – preferably using a carolina rig baited with a Zoom ultra vibe speed craw in green pumpkin . his knack for figuring out bass has translated into $ 78,688 in 16 tour events , or average winnings of $ 4,918 per tournament – hardly the track record of the typical novice .
dealing With hits and misses except for a little bit of seed money he saved while working as a building materials salesman for a california company , and
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help from his family , patek is going it alone now . his only sponsor is phenix Rods , which helps him out with tackle . he competes out of a 2011 model Ranger Z521 and pays for his own travel expenses and tackle , looking ahead and waiting for his big break to come along , hopefully sooner rather than later . prior to this year , patek ’ s best finish came in 2016 at pickwick lake , where he finished ninth . his season overall last year was a reasonably decent one as he collected checks in every event except hartwell and champlain , where he bombed . in fact , his 156thplace finish at champlain offers a good example of what befalls many rookies who are just starting out and have limited experience on various lakes . |
“ in practice i got on a terrific frog bite near fort ticonderoga , but then a front came through and it really screwed up the fishing ,” notes patek . “ after day one i was near last place with three fish and 5 1 / 2 pounds . i got 15 pounds the second day , but the damage was already done .” although patek didn ’ t have a plan B for a lake he ’ d never fished before , he at least was adaptable enough to know that smallmouths were spawning elsewhere and scratched out a solid limit . he finished the year in 44th place overall , and the fact that the champlain fiasco probably cost him a berth in the forrest Wood cup still rankles . |
learning From adversity disappointment fuels his determination , but patek knows he ’ s got to stop making the unforced errors that cost him precious points toward qualifying for this year ’ s cup . for instance , in the lake travis tournament patek ’ s shot at placing higher was ruined because he underestimated how long it would take to get back to the weigh-in site .
“ i came in four minutes late – completely unnecessary ,” he says . “ i made a huge mistake
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and completely forgot about all the boat traffic that would slow me down . My thought process was that i had one little Guadalupe bass i needed to cull , so i gave myself only 35 minutes to get back from where i was in the pedernales River [ arm ]. But there were some big boats between there and takeoff , and i had to back way off .
“ When i saw that i only had a few minutes left and i still had a long way to go , i thought ‘ uh-oh , i ’ m not going to make it .’ My proudest moment in a tournament up to that point was leading after two days . Maybe i wouldn ’ t have won it anyway , but to screw up like that – i guarantee it won ’ t happen to me again because of a mental mistake .” perhaps not , but there are other pitfalls waiting , and patek will trip over his fair share of them as he matures . his short tournament record reflects that he has a knack for finding bass and then catching them , even on fisheries that are unfamiliar to him , which is to say just about everywhere . as was the case for many aspiring young pros before him , though , he ’ s now discovering that the devil is in all the other details that separate middle-of-the-pack finishes from what might have been .
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