Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 9, 1993 TAG: 9305090105
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: E11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN
DATELINE: SOUTH HILL LENGTH: Medium
Going into Friday's final day, the top Virginian - Jimmy Coleman of Amherst - ranked 71st. Woo Daves was 94th, a position that reminded him of the time he weighed a skimpy 4-pound catch before a tournament crowd that included his mom.
"That's embarrassing," she told him.
Beyond the 100 mark in the standings were solid Virginia fishing names, like James Dudley and Jerry Elder. Elder didn't want to talk about it.
Friday morning, Daves went looking for big bass, and found five beauties that weighed 18 pounds, 2 ounces, the top catch of the day. That moved him to 28th, which was the most excitement in the mundane contest. More importantly it qualified him for the BASS Masters Classic by a threadbare margin of 1 pound, 2 ounces.
Coleman also made a last-day charge, finishing 31st. But he and Daves were the only Virginians in the money (the top 75).
Why was the 50,000-acre Kerr, Virginia's mother lake, so tough on her sons?
You have to go back to late winter and early spring in the Roanoke Valley and beyond to find the answer. That's when runoff from the blizzard, followed by heavy rains, sent floodwaters swirling down the Roanoke River, inflating the level of Kerr.
The lake didn't just push its way back into the shoreline willows, it went well beyond that, covering the picnic tables, the campsites and launching ramps, then claiming some of the public roads.
It has been high all spring, and while the level had fallen by tournament time, yards of discolored water still covered some of the favorite fishing spots of Virginia anglers.
"For most of us, you don't see the water up this high very often," Daves said.
One of the country's top shallow-water worm fishing experts, Daves tried to work magic with his own creation, a Woo Worm. But the efforts failed during the early part of the tournament.
"I live and die by the Woo Worm and the Woo Worm died on me today," he said at Thursday's weigh-in.
On Friday, he switched to a chartreuse-and-white Mepps spinnerbait with dual No. 6 willow leaf blades, one silver and one gold. He caught three fat bass, then went back to the worm, landing a couple 4-pounders 10 minutes before the tournament ended.
Familiarity with a lake can become an adversary if you keep going back to favorite spots when they aren't working for you, said Gary Klein, a Texas pro who ranks first in the 1993 B.A.S.S. Angler of the Year standings.
"The reason the locals were having such a hard time, they were running around fishing spots," Klein said. "Most of them know little rock piles and little bushes. When you have above normal water, all of a sudden you can't reach those spots.
"So the true professionals come in here and smoke them because we understand the fish. We could care less about the lake. We hunt new water and we develop patterns. We end up catching fish where the locals don't know there are fish."
That was the case for winner Denny Brauer, of Camdenton, Mo. While many of the Virginia anglers were tossing a spinnerbait, remembering how good the flashy lure can be at Kerr in the spring, Brauer headed up the lake and spent three days pitching and flipping a "pumpkin-green" lizard. It gave him a 48-pound, 4-ounce total.
"I don't think I had a bite all week when they actually tapped it or thumped it," he said. "You'd pick up and one would be there. They were very subtle."
And spooky. Fishermen were having to deal with bass in a post-spawn slump, Brauer said.
"They just get real finicky. They are off their feed. It is almost like they get sick. Not only don't they eat, they are just hard to get close to."
By the end of the tournament, some Virginia anglers were acting the same way.
by CNB