Dallas was great. I got home on Sunday. Now it’s time to put the last minute finishing touches on everything before heading towards Oklahoma today. That sounds so simple when you write it, like it’s really nothing. But the truth is something different.
This business of cutting down the tackle I carry is tearing me apart. It has to be done. I need to get back to basics. That’s for sure. Regardless of what I know in my brain, however, I’m still having trouble with my heart.
Every time I look inside a storage compartment I think maybe I should add something else just to be sure. They just don’t look full enough to me. The reality is, of course, that they’re as full as can be. I’m not sure I could put anything else in one of them if I tried.
It’ll all work out in the end, though. I’ll have what I have, and then go fishing. That’s really what it’s all about. If I can’t catch them with what I’ve got I probably don’t deserve to catch them. Besides, I learned a lot when I was out there just before it went off-limits. I have some spots marked and, depending upon what they’re doing and what the weather is like, I should have all the tools I need.
My best guess is that I’ll be doing what I often do in these big events. I’ll move around from one spot to another until (hopefully) I find a bunch of bass big enough to win. The thing is about Grand Lake is that it’s really big. Running around on it can eat up a lot of fishing time. You have to be right, most of the time anyway, for that strategy to work.
Towards that end I have something new on my boat this year that’ll help me get where I’m going in a hurry, and without burning a lot of fuel. It’s called Hullspeed. It’s a coating you put on the bottom of your boat which makes it slick so that it glides through the water with less resistance. You can get a color to match your hull. It’s pretty easy to put on, too.
All you do is lift the boat up, rough up the surface a little bit and then paint it on with a roller or a brush. You can do everything in one afternoon for as little as $300. We didn’t have one bit of trouble when we put it on my boat. I should be able to push up my top running speed, get on plane quicker and save a few bucks on gas. All that’ll help if I end up running a milk run out there next week.=
One other thing: If there’s any way you can make it to this year’s Classic I encourage you to do so. Several local favorites are fishing and I’d guess that the action will be fast and furious. And, you can follow the action right from the floor of the Expo while you’re checking out all the new products.
Mike Iaconelli’s column appears weekly on Bassmaster.com. You can also find Mike Iaconelli on Facebook and Twitter.
