LA CROSSE, Wis. — Spending as much time as possible on a primary area is a given for tournament anglers. Being forced to leave early, or not gaining access at all to a favored area is an afterthought.
Not so on the upper Mississippi River and specifically where most large tournaments are held out of La Crosse. Tournament waters are typically the expansive area encompassing river pools 7, 8 and 9, as they are for the St. Croix Bassmaster Open at Mississippi River presented by SEVIIN.
The spoiler in having unlimited time access to anywhere on that three-pool stretch are the lock-and-dams providing access to pools 7 and 9 (La Crosse is in Pool 8).
Arriving at the lock and expecting it open and close on demand is out of the question. Priority is given to commercial barge traffic with locking times ranging from one to three hours depending on a single or double barge passage.
“It’s like no other river system we fish, because it’s not like you have eight hours to spend on any given area,” said Brad Leuthner, eighth place on Day 1. “Beyond the locking schedule you have to also take into consideration the river is always fluctuating; fish constantly moving on the falling water, relocating to different habitats.”
The Minneapolis area angler knows the drill so well that he hoped for the best and planned for the worst with his primary area located far into Pool 9. Leuthner made it there, but gave himself three extra hours to get back into Pool 8 due to barges occupying the lock on the backside of his competition day.
Think about that. Three fishing hours subtracted from the day. Strategically, Leuthner also had a backup plan in Pool 8, where he could catch between 12 and 14 pounds.
“It’s a safety measure but that’s also just the average daily catch for this tournament; you have to go for more quality fish to stay inside the Top 10,” he said.
Another regular in this stretch of river is Janesville, Wis. Angler Brian Post, in the Top 20 after Day 1. Post did the math to determine travel times by specific location to know if he could make it to and from a primary spot in Pool 9, also given the locking schedule. The sum of the whole was the available fishing time remaining.
On Day 1 it took Post nine minutes at 5.4 mph to travel the distance of the no-wake zone between the takeoff point and main river. From there, another 23 minutes to Pool 9 lock, another 20 minutes to lock through and finally, 29 minutes to his spot. Tallied up that was one hour, 20 minutes of travel time.
Post and other river rats know to stay friendly with the lockmaster, who they will call to confirm ETAs and other inside info about upbound and downbound barge traffic. Another must-have tool is MarineTraffic, an app with a map that displays the location and details of ships in real time according to beaconing from their GPS transponder.
Cade Laufenberg, alumnus of the Winona State University fishing team and Onalaska, Wis., native had a story to tell about how the lock schedule can play into the fate of a given day.
A call to the lockmaster confirmed a barge showing up on the app would take two hours to pass through the lock into Pool 9. Based on the timing, that delayed tournament boats from gaining early morning early access to the area where Laufenberg would ideally like to be.
“I had a later boat number so the lock closed for those two hours before I could get there,” he said. “So, for me that was a good thing.”
Laufenberg spent the downtime in Pool 8 getting a limit started there, and then staged at the lock in time to make the passage after the two-hour wait. As a result, he made it to Pool 9 and back with his limit weighing 18-1, good for fourth-place after Day 1.
“It’s a fly-by-the-seat-of-your pants proposition,” summed up Post. “But it’s worth the gamble if you want to win.”
Winning here takes on a whole different meaning when plans for a great day can be spoiled by outlying factors beyond just catching the fish.
