20
Tactics
JEREMY LAWYER
SARCOXIE, MO.
21 LBS
by Tyler Brinks
Lawyer admits that he completely missed the herring
bite. He had never fished on a lake with herring, and because
of that, he focused his efforts on fishing shallow riprap banks
in the Saluda and Little Saluda rivers.
He fished parallel to the riprap, keeping his boat very
close to the bank. The best stretches had slightly deeper
water – approximately 4 to 5 feet – and Lawyer found more
submerged rock in the extra depth. He also caught fish on
flat clay points where the riprap ended.
“I had a good practice, but the fishing was getting worse
each day,” he says. “The first day of the tournament was over-
cast late into the morning, and that helped keep the fish
shallow, but the second day was calm and sunny, and it
made things tough.”
The key for Lawyer was to rotate through lures while cov-
ering water. His junk-fishing approach led to a limit of 10
pounds, 5 ounces on the first day and 10 pounds, 11 ounces
on the second day.
Baits
Tactics
SHANE L E HEW
19
Lawyer estimates he had 15 rods on the deck, and several
baits produced for him. His key lures were a Freedom Lures
buzzbait with a Zoom Horny Toad, Zoom Z Craw Jr., LIVETAR-
GET BaitBall Glass Minnow Popper and JaKKed Baits DoKK
RoKK jig. He also caught fish on a shaky head, drop-shot and
soft stick bait.
CATAWBA, N.C.
21 LBS, 3 OZ
by Jody White
Fishing fairly familiar patterns not far from home, Shane
LeHew might have had a better tournament if day two had
not gone so disastrously.
“I had between 25 and 30 blowups,” says LeHew of the
second round. “I was throwing the same bait as everyone
else, and I think I hooked seven of them and landed two. I
ran, like, 10 cane piles in a row and had a bite on every one
of them. It seemed like it just wasn’t my time to catch one.”
LeHew did catch a 3-pounder from under a dock on the
first day, but for the most part he stuck to the offshore game.
He ran a succession of cane piles as did many of the other
top finishers, but mixed in some schooling places as well. He
shared his best schooling area, which was a big shoal in the
middle of the lake, with Anthony Gagliardi, but didn’t quite
time it right on day two and wound up missing the cut.
Baits
84
Like many other anglers, LeHew relied on a chrome-col-
ored ima Little Stick 135, but he also caught one keeper on a
Shane’s Baits Straight Buzzin’ in-line buzzbait rigged with a
white toad. Another came from a cane pile on a Zoom Fluke.
FLWFISHING.COM I OCTOBER 2017