ryan

Dr. Hook, hindsight is definitely 20/20. There is no way of knowing just exactly how you will end up. You do what you can control, and we felt we could control getting the maximum number of fish to weigh. It may not be a winning box, but you have caught your number, and no one can really question you. You fish for the fun, but you also fish to win, or place in the top ten or so, and you can't do that without getting your number. We had lots of trout to clean, and give to people who love em, which is rewarding in itself

Definitely not a rumor! They got on the kings and patterned them from the get go. We had hoped to do the same, but could not get the king program going. then it comes down to having to get ten fish to weigh, and see where the chips fall. I dont get to excited about grease, and would never choose to just fish for them, but you got to take whats there to get your number

Catch your grease and you are now bringing 10 fish to the scale, instead of 5 \

Come fish the Steeelheaders challenge in may Dave, its a great tourney and we would like to see you stop whining and perform under some pressure

Nice work. 240. you ended up about 120 to 140 ft too deep

The difference is..If your not in the pack after the first day, there is little chance to have a good day and get back in it..unless of course you catch 5 25 pound kings

So we fished the Muskegon Triport over the weekend under the catch 10 weigh 5 format, and heres my take. First things first I am hoping the BRC comittee is not mislead by the reasons for the big turnout. There were 80 boats,22 Pros and 58 Ams, the biggest turnout on the trail so far. As most know this was a three port tournament, which I believe was the major reason for the turnout. Secondly, allowing the boats to sign up rght up untill the captains meeting was a major factor for getting the smaller boats in, who had an oppurtunity to keep an eye on the weather up till the tournament and decide if they wanted to fish. No late fees or waiting around after paying a month in advance to hope the lake is fishable. In my opinion the catch format had little to no effect. On to the fishing: Congrats to the winners and those who were able to find the big fish, because there were tons of little fish around. Ive read alot of opinions on this format and the dumbed down quotes are right on the money. The competive excitement we have on tournament day definitely did not equal that of any other tournament we have ever fished. For us there wasnt the excitement of catching your number, it was all about not catching, as in little fish. Tournaments should be about catching your number. You should be rewarded for catching a 3# coho on a meat rig, not seeing that fish go down as one less opportunity to get a bigger one. Which poses the question..there are lots of people that oppose the 5 fish,and those that like it. But what is the sound fundamental reason for only allowing 10 fish to be caught? I would love to know the reasoning. Give teams more margin for error as you might call it, or more room to manuever as far as upping it to 15 or DNR limit. This alone I believe would make a better transition into the catch 5 format. There is one major flaw I see in this format: There is no real opportunity to make a huge jump in the standings for a boat who would have a less than stellar day one. That was one of the best parts of a catch 10,12,or 15. You just cant make up the points in a five fish format. Thats what keeps teams going on day 2, the excitement of havin an awesome day, and knowing that if the boats ahead of u had tougher ones, you could make a huge jump in the standings. So, just my opinion. Great lakes salmon fishing is the most thrilling rewarding fishing out there. Put it in a tournament format, and the excitement is incredible, dumb it down with a catch 5 format, and you kill the excitement.

Nice work. Always enjoy listening to whine all morning about boat traffic as well

With the Grand Haven Offshore approaching this weekend, i thought i would take some time to tell our story about the biggest tournament on the trail for us. To the guys out there that are on the fence about tournaments, I thought i would provide a story that could sway your opinion on the topic. We are the Wild at Heart Fishing Team. We fish out of a 22 foot century. Not huge, but tournament ready. Quickly, in 2008, our first year in the Offshore was quite an experience. 7 fish on day one was ok for us considering the rough seas that can make it tough for a boat like ours to fish well. Day two brought clear skies and calm seas and we boxed 12 fish in two hours of fishing. As a tournament team in year 6 now, that was our first ever 12 fish tournament limit. We now knew that we could do it. The 2009 Offshore came with great anticipation for us. We really felt we could compete. Two rough days of prefishing and eliminating water told us where not to fish. After some helpful tips from charter captains and teams we knew quite well... Day 1 arrived. What an exciting morning to be competing. We set up basically in traffic that morning because we knew the salmon were there. We took our first 7 kings in about the first two hours. A great start. The most memorable part of that was trolling about as close as you can without problems or boat damage next to a well known charter boat from up north (I wont mention the name) and poppin 5 fish in about 30 minutes while they caught none. They watched all the action on our 22 footer and i tell you what... it felt great. Kind of like we belonged! Keeping on our waypoint back and forth we boxed our 12. Although the last one took forever. After all the boats were weighed in we were sittin pretty. Stuck in a log jam in the top 15 two points behind eventual champion Team Double Down. Its hard to beat the feeling of being in contention day 2 as your rollin through the pierheads. And its hard to beat the feeling of a little pressure knowing you have to catch twelve again. But hey... this is what we sign up for. Day 2 brought clear skies, calm seas, and about 12 different boats setting up close to our waypoints. Not good. 2hours of trolling brought us only two fish this time. Now were against the clock. Time to make a move. Go for broke as some might say. Decided quickly to run it in to about 80 to 90 where nobody was fishin. What a move. In short we pulled five fish in close to an hour. We had a great average weight going. If we could catch 5 more with that average we would have been top 3. We had 2 an a half hours to get em. We were in the zone and rollin. Wouldnt you know... we must have caught the only 5 fish in there. So close, but yet so far away. Thats tournament fishin for ya. What an effort put in by Team Double Down with the crews first victory. These guys fish in a 20 footer, respectively. They are a standard in the AM division. And a great bunch of guys to fish against and compare yourself too. Small boat anglers can do well out there in the tournaments guys. Dont let your boat size shy you away. Also dont expect instant success right away. Instead be willing to learn and take your lumps as a fun learning experience. Give tournament fishing a try, you just might be glad you did.

If you want to put more fish in the box on days when the fishing is tough in my opinion the copper will do that for you. We traded in the leadcore for copper with the exception of the halfcore. Copper in the shorter length of 75, 100, 150, 200 cam be deadly for kings year round. those are all set up with 45lb. The 100 foot seems to always catch big kings when they arent so deep. We also fish to 300 45lb with great success. Buying a 300 30 lb is a great way to go. It has been out fishing all other coppers the last two years. The 450 is a beast but hey...Fish on. As far as tournament fishing goes copper can be the difference in comin in with a box of twelve fish. As opposed to seven. Late in the mornin the coppers can round out your box. Are the days where leadcore out fishes it? Absolutely. But the key to the copper is the depth you can achieve with a shorter length.

Once again the Wild At Heart Fishing Team was back out on the water looking to take it to the fish after a bit of a dissapointing tournament. What a great night to go fishing. Worked north of the stacks in 140 to 205 all night. We ended up going 14 for 16 with our two lost fish coming off right behind the boat. It was a blurry nite so ill do the best i can here. 4 of our fish were kings over ten pounds withe the biggest one around 14-15. The big one came on a double orange crush gold on a half core. The other 3 were on a free slider JP slammer king killer, a light tackle rigger with moonshine double trouble 60 down, and an 11'' white echip paddle with an oceanic fly 100 down. This paddle also took a decent lake trout. The rest of the fish came on half cores, coppers 200, 300s, sliders, and riggers. Doc silver,gold,green dolphin mag, moonshine mongolian beef were the other spoons that took fish. A 450 copper with an 8'' white echip paddle and Big Weenie no see um fly caught a laker and a king. A fireline diver with a mountain dew spinny/pickled sunshine fly took a nice fish as well as a wire diver with a 10'' UV spinny/ pickled sunshine fly. Best troll was basically East and west .

Steiny, nice job on the fish. Looks like youll be addin those to the Double Down arsenal? We have two pro kings we fish: #91 black gold/white ladderback, and mag green dolphin. Great for kings. Lookin forward to seein you guys in two weeks.

sorry for the late report on this. Set up in 100 fow a bit south of the Holland pierheads after the 7 oclock shotgun start and headed on a sw troll. Hooked our first fish on a dr 50 down and lost it at the back of the boat. k\Kind of came back to haunt us. The first fish we landed came on an nbk stinger on a free slider. All three riggers quickly were changed to nbk sliders and took two more kings and two lakers on them. At 8:30 we had five decent fish in the box. Worked 100 to 130 with no more fish. Finally after an hour we took a fish on a rigger 60 down with a half moonshine green with ladderback. Our last fish came on a 300 copper black/green ladderback moonshine. Seems like we get stuck on 7 alot in the tournaments. Did not pick up a fish in the last 2 and a half hours. For some reason we cant catch the small ones we need to round out the box?? Out of 41 boats we finished 8th, a respectable finish. Beat all the boats who weighed 8fish. Had 41 total pounds and suprisingly had the third highest weight. We were 10 pounds short of the winners who weighed twelve. We fished hard today and took some good lessons home with us. Congratulations to the Maatley Crew on their victory. Next stop is the Grand Haven Offshore Classic.

We finally made it out of port sheldon ( our home port) for the first time this year. After our tough day sunday in the South Haven Pro Am we were ready to take it out on the fish. We fished from 5pm to sunset and ended up 12-16. A few small cohos and a bunch of king in the 4 to 8 pound range. 1 steelhead(released) and one king around 12 pounds. Coppers in the 150, 200 and 2 300s took 7 fish out of ten bites. Mag green dolphins, flounder pounder blue, and half moonshine greem with a ladderback ( thanks team double down) on the coppers. Area 51, mongolian jp slammer, and agent orange moonshine took fish on the riggers 40 to 60 down. Our biggest fish came on a wire 275 back with a 10 inch glow frog racer spinny and a pickled sunshine fly. 90 to 120 was the best. marked lots of bait and northeast troll worked best. Good to see the nite bite goin strong. Thursday morning we headed south out of port sheldon expecting to set the world on fire. But the fish had other plans. We fish from 90 to 205. 6 for 10 with 3 kings 12 to 14 pounds. 2 kings about 1 pound each and a 7 pound steelie (released). the bigger kings were caught on flounder pounder blue on 300 copper, lite tackle rigger with half moonshine green laderback 50 down, and 11 inch white paddle/ oceanic fly 130 dow on the chute rigger. The two dinks were caught on a jp slammer carmel dolphin on the 150 copper. When we hit 185 we threw out a double orange crush on a half core and caught the steelie. 10 min later we lost a big steelie on the same setup. Beautiful morning to be on the water. Holland Steelheaders tournament on Saturday. The Wild At Heart Fishing Team is ready to rock!

Sorry im a little late on the report. The Wild at Heart boat made its shakedown trip to the Joe on Saturday. We were greeted with excellent fishing conditions. We got into the coho pretty quick. We went 14 for 17. All were cohos and 1 steelhead that released himself. We ran a 10 rod spread consisting of 5 high line boards with thin fins and jointed rapalas. A fireline and mono diver set on 3 with 00 dodgers and peanut flies set 15 to 30 ft back. We fished two riggers with no success. Whe also ran a like a three color down the chute that took six bites. We basically worked 15 to 20 fow. Temps ranged from 45 to 47. Thin fins in red with black stripes, gold, and green did the damage on the boards with a firetiger jointed and orange jointed rapalas doing well also. Dipseys with the peanut flies made up for the rest. South troll was hot but we did manage to pick some up on the north troll. We easily could have got our limit but we decided to go work the plume for a while with no luck. 1 week till the Brown Blast! We will be heading down on friday to prefish and workin to better our two consecutive 2nd place finishes into a !st

With the Brown Blast being April 10 just around the corner i thought i would share our story and thoughts on this 1 day tournament to spark some more interest among fisherman on this site. This tournament is held out of St. Joe. In 2008 the Wild at Heart Fishing Team decided we would make one of our weekend trips down to the Joe for a fun days fishing. Through a post online we heard about this tournament that would be running down there the same weekend. The entry fee was 30$ per boat. Well, we figured since we were going down there anyways that we would give it a try. Well guys, what a day it proved to be as we went 20 for 22 with 18 coho and a 9 and 10 pound brown. We also lost about an 8 pound brown 20 feet behind the boat. With an extra 5 bonus points awarded for brown trout, we were feeling pretty good! We ended up with a second place finish that day and the payback was excellent for a 30$ entry. Well in 2009 it was a no brainer to go down there and defend our second place from the previous year. Conditions were not that great with 3 to 4 foot seas pounding us all morning. Fishing was tough on everyone. It was alot of work to manage putting 5 coho in the box to give us our 5 weighable fish! We decide that if we could find one decent fish we might give ourselves a chance. Our plan was to move out into the cleaner water and look for some kings that would help us. And wouldnt you know: we ended up putting a 16 and a half pound king in the box! We went to the weigh in hopeful, but not sure. It turned out that our 4 coho and a king were good enough to take second again and the king was big fish fior the day. We fell short to a team that made a plan to work the pierheads for their bonus fish. A 13 pound brown with 5 bonus points that left us three points short. So if anyone is heading down to the Joe for that weekend i encourage you to give this tournament a try. The guys who run this are a class act and it is very well run. And of course, the Wild at Heart Fishing Team will be there, trying to get over the hump of two second place finishes!

hey bobber what about that handsome stud on the holland pier. Nice fish! How old were you in that picture?

In my opinion, if you can make it happen, the chute rigger is the most valuable rigger on your boat. We run 3 cannon mag10hs on our boat with an 8' beam. Our chute rigger is run basically on the bottom all year long at any depth of water with a flasher fly combo. typically an 11'' protroll e chip paddle. on days where the fishing is tough this is our goto rod. It is a very reliable setup in the tournaments we fish. big kings are the norm! it also is a great way to catch lakers on the slow days or in the tournaments when we need them. I for one would find it exteremely hard to fish without a chute rigger.

One of our hottest setups all year long was a wire diver set on 1 1/2 back 250-330 with a spinny/fly combo. Now on that same side, our inside board was usually 300 ft of 45# copper with a spoon. The copper had an off year for us compared to years past. my question is, how close do u think these two rigs might be running next to eachother in the water?

thanx for the info john. Gonna try the mags this year i think. While on the subject, what are your preferred colors for your divers?

my name is ryan. i fish on the wild at heart boat with my dad kevin. My question is for the guys who run four divers, two per side, with wires for low divers and say fireline for the high divers. was wonderin if the low divers should be runnin the mag divers as a standard for seperation purporses.I would love some input on this.