If You're Gonna Make a Splash, Might As Well Make a Big 'Un, Right?

There are at least a couple of fellas who know exactly what I'm talking about. The one guy had just bought a brand new Tracker TX-17 and was going to fish his very first bass-club tournament at a local lake with his oldest daughter.

Come tournament day, this guy had been floating around in his shiny new boat, talking with several other club members when he realized his take-off number was getting close to being called. He kicked his trolling motor on high and headed down the bank in shallow water to get around all his buddies' boats and move into position to fire up his gas motor.

Unfortunately, what he didn't see...and therefore didn't consider...was all the cables just underwater that held down the dock to the bottom of the lake. His trolling motor hit the cables at full speed, triggering a rubber-band effect that launched him airborne out of the boat head-first. All he could do at this point was dive.

Needless to say, everything went downhill from there. And fellow club members never let him forget that day. Every time one sees him, they flash a big smile and call him "the human depthfinder."

In another case, a fella was launching his boat in his first-ever tournament when he got a bad case of the jitters from feeling as though everyone...none of whom he knew...was staring at him. He got so stressed out that he fell off the trailer while climbing into the boat and totally embarrassed himself.

As noted by Wired2Fish writer Walker Smith...and the man who fell off his trailer..."It wasn't a small splash. It was a full submersion, under-the-water kind of fall."

Let's face it--people generally tend to mess up the most when they're nervous and trying their hardest not to mess up. For that reason, Smith has some tips to help calm others' jitters during tournaments.

Don't play tickle bunny. That's Smith's way of saying, "Don't spend the day retying lures when you're not getting many bites. It's important to understand that you're chasing an animal with a brain the size of your pinky fingernail. I'm not trying to diminish the challenge of bass fishing, but I think it's imperative to bring ourselves back down to earth every now and then to simplify our collective approach. After all, it's just fishing.

"The important thing is to know your strengths and weaknesses and do everything possible to zero-in on the techniques you're best at. Have confidence in what you're throwing, and if you're not getting bites, move. Try to fish the current conditions. If it doesn't feel right, though, don't fish it. Confidence seems to be the most common characteristic among outstanding tournament anglers."

Keep that trolling motor in the water. While it's sometimes important to crank the big motor and run to new spots, some of the best tournament anglers tend to settle down in one area and just fish.

As Walker noted in the previous segment: "Confidence is key."

"I think the more you doubt your decisions, the worse you're going to fish," he said. "If you think you're in an area with fish and a discernible pattern, I'd encourage you to stick it out for at least an hour or two and see what you can figure out.

"A buddy of mine once told me, 'Every second your trolling motor isn't in the water is a second you're not making a cast or catching a fish.'

"That sure made a lot of sense to me. When I first started fishing tournaments, my buddies would poke fun at me after weigh-in with comments about how much they had seen me running at 70 mph throughout the day. I'd pull up to a stretch of bank, make a few casts, and immediately start doubting myself. That would lead to my pulling up the trolling motor and running all over God's creation, trying to find something that felt comfortable. After a few hours of doing that, it's easy to get spun-out and totally abandon your game plan."

You're going to lose a lot more tournaments than you win. "Around my parts," said Smith, "you're fishing against 200-plus boats, and a lot of them are full of outstanding anglers. The numbers just simply aren't in your favor. The idea that you're going to beat those guys every weekend won't do anything other than put undue pressure on yourself. If you want to maximize your enjoyment of tournament bass fishing, it's important to become a good loser. Don't have sour grapes. Be happy for the winners and go shake their hands. Statistically speaking, we're all going to lose more than we win in this game; that's what makes it so addictive.

"When I fish a tournament, I only care about what weight won. It doesn't matter to me who caught what and who had a bad day. So if you have a bad day on the water, don't get all self-conscious and think everyone noticed. I can absolutely assure you they didn't. You either win the tournament, or you learn valuable lessons for next time. Try to keep that in mind, and your confidence will skyrocket."

In conclusion, Smith offers this advice, "The tournament community is normally an awesome group of folks, so don't be afraid to jump into a Saturday or Sunday derby. Don't put too much pressure on yourself. Just do your thing, and don't flip out if you don't catch 'em. It happens to everybody."