• Jerry Brumbaugh (@jerrybrumbaugh13) • Instagram photos and videos
Monday 6 May 2019

2019 FLW Tour Recap – Lake Chickamauga

Posted at 3:48 PM

It never seizes to amaze me how crucial one fish can be to an entire season.  Most fans don’t realize how tight the points can be and a single fish can move you up and down the season long standings.  I had this experience on Lake Chickamauga this past week.  On the second day with a few hours left to fish I lost a 5lb class fish that got me wrapped up under a dock and eventually broke me off.  This fish would have culled me up 3 ½ lbs. which would have been enough for a check and a top 60 finish, which would have moved me up a little in the season point standings and further secure my position inside the Forrest Wood Cup cutoff.  Unfortunately, I didn’t land the fish and finished in 104th place, which dropped me outside of the championship cutoff all the way to 53rd place.  I now have my work cut out for me to make the Cup in August.

My practice was tough due to missing almost two days to a malfunctioning trolling motor.  I didn’t make my first cast with a working trolling motor until about 4:00 PM on the second day of practice.  I ran around the lake looking for some spawners and staging fish, but didn’t find a whole lot. 

I got an early boat number so I decided to run down lake after a couple of nice spawners I had seen the last day of practice.  I was able to catch one of them, about a 4 ½ lber, but the others were gone.  I then started to run spawning pockets blind casting a Berkley General around and consistently caught fish and was able to work my way up to 14 lbs. 9 oz. and tied for 59th place.

The second day I decided to start up the river and got on a shad spawn deal with a Dirty Jigs Swim Jig.  I caught several fish, but lost two decent keepers that would have really helped.  I then ran down lake and began fishing spawning pockets with the General and caught lots of fish, but was only culling by ounces.  Towards the end of the day I broke off the 5 lb. fish which capped off the event for me.  I ended up weighing 10 lbs. 11 oz. and fell to 104th place.  I’ve got about six weeks off to think about that fish and figure out a way to catch them at Lake Champlain to get back into the FWC.