BAINBRIDGE, Ga. — Greg Hackney feels comfortable on Lake Seminole. It reminds him of the lower Arkansas River, where he grew up and learned to bass fish. After a slow start on Day 1, Hackney found his comfort zone Friday, zooming from 44th place on Thursday to third place on Day 2 of the Gamakatsu Bassmaster Elite at Lake Seminole. His five-bass limit of 24 pounds, 7 ounces, the second biggest bag of the day, gave him a two-day total of 38-12.
More importantly, Hackney may have cracked the code on this lake, which has produced frustration and inconsistency for much of the 104-angler field. For instance, Day 1 leader Will Davis Jr. fell to 27th place after following up 21-13 with 10-5 Friday. On the other end of the inconsistency scale, Caleb Sumrall jumped from a 67th place tie with 12-14 on Day 1 to 10th place on Day 2 with 22-0.
“The deal is there’s a lot of fish up (shallow) that have probably been up,” Hackney said. “There’s also a lot of fish that haven’t got there yet. It’s kind of a weird deal. We’ve had such warm weather, but there’s so much water running through the system that it’s keeping it colder. The water temperature is not warming up with these 80-degree days. The main river is still about 60 degrees. So many of these fish live there and spawn there and don’t ever go back into anything.”
Hackney estimated he caught between 15 and 20 bass Friday. They were all about the same size, so much so that he had a hard time picking out the two biggest ones to hold up on the weigh-in stage. He said he probably released a best five that would have weighed 17 or 18 pounds.
The 49-year-old pro who lives in Gonzales, La., has won over $2.5 million on the B.A.S.S. tour, is a three-time Elite Series champion and earned the 2014 Bassmaster Angler of the Year title. He’s always guarded about how he’s catching them during a tournament. He offered a few clues yesterday.
“I spent most of my time (in practice) looking for pre-spawn fish, not spawning fish,” Hackney said. “Once everybody got so good at it, tournaments here are not won (sight-fishing for spawners). They burn them up the first couple of days.”
Seminole hasn’t offered even that this week. Sight-fishing simply hasn’t played significantly the first two days.
“This is a fine place,” Hackney said. “It has really got ‘em. I don’t know if they’ll show up, but they’re here. They’re in super great shape. There’s just something that’s got everybody confused a little bit. I can’t explain it.”
Based on the big smile on his face at the weigh-in and the 24-pound, 7-ounce bag he brought to the scales, Hackney may be well on his way to explaining it.
