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BIG BASS TOURNAMENT
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| Date: | | September 9, 2007 |
| Tournament: | | Anchor Big Bass Round Up 2007 |
| Date: | | September 9, 2007 |
| Tournament: | | Anchor Big Bass Round Up 2007 |
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| Brent Bartsch takes home over $28,000 with 2 fish at Choke Canyon. |
| By: Bass Champs Staff |
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Brent Bartsch weighs in the top 2 Bass at Choke Canyon and takes home over $28,000 in Cash and Prizes including a New Skeeter SX 190.
The First Annual Anchor Marine Big Bass Round-up on Choke Canyon is now in the books. Over 270 anglers made their first cast at 6:30 AM this past Sunday, September 9th on Choke Canyon with one thing on their mind, Big Bass! This event, sponsored by Anchor Marine of San Antonio, Texas featured hourly big bass paybacks, and a new Skeeter SX 190 with a Yamaha VMAX 150 and Minn Kota trolling motor for the overall heaviest fish of the day valued over $27,000.
Choke Canyon has developed a reputation over the past few years as having giant bass and lots of them. The lake has given up multiple record setting five fish bags during Bass Champs team events with several sacks weighing over 40 lbs and one weighing 44.98 lbs this past season. So, expectations were high as everyone anticipated someone bringing in a huge fish. But, with recent rains raising the lake and changing the color of the water, many anglers had a difficult time locating fish.
The first hour started off only seeing only 12 fish come to the scales and Rick Shock, of Victoria, Tx bringing in a 8.50 to win the $500 1st place check.
Each hour more and more fish came in. The third hour provided two fish over 9 lbs with Brent Bartsch of Dale, TX edging out Jaime Buitron by only .12 of a pound. Brent stated, “We’ve got a good spot located, and we’re going right back to it.”
Two hours later, Brent came in for the 12 o’clock hour with another big fish. He already had the overall lead with his 9.28 from earlier, but now he was about to be in the lead for another hour. Tournament emcee, Chad Potts, asked Brent if he thought this fish was bigger than the first fish, and he replied, “It’s going to be close, but I think it’s a little bigger”. After the scales settled, the fish was almost a full pound heavier and Brent now had the two heaviest fish of the day (9.26 and 10.20) with only three hours remaining in the competition. After Brent and his partner left the 10 o’clock weigh in, they went right back to the same spot and within two minutes caught the 10.20. They immediately came right back to weigh-in and just made the 12 o’clock weigh in. Brent was extremely nervous and commented that, “This was going to be the longest three hours of his life”.
When asked how he caught the fish, Brent replied, “We were Carolina Rigging a small rock pile in about 15-20 feet of water. All three of the big fish were caught on a seven inch Watermelon Red Berkley power lizard.” Brent continued, “This is a really fun event. I’d like to thank Anchor Marine and Bass Champs for putting this event on. We are definitely coming back next year”
After the awards ceremony, a drawing was held from the over 150 anglers that took a Skeeter Demo Ride on Saturday. One card was pulled out of the box, and Ram Pichardo was announced as the winner of the $1500 Cash Prize. Ram said afterwards, “This is great! I didn’t win any of the hourly money, but, I’ll gladly take this.” He continued with a big smile and said, “I’d rather be lucky than good any day”.
As the tournament wrapped up, J.D. Fontenot, the owner of Anchor Marine, thanked all of the anglers for coming out and participating in the first annual event and welcomed everyone back for an even better event next year.
Special thanks to the Choke Canyon Lodge and the Three Rivers Chamber of Commerce for providing the lodging for the Bass Champs Staff.
The next Bass Champs is the 2nd Annual Berkley Big Bass Event on Lake Fork. October, 13th & 14th. For more information go to http://www.basschamps.com/basschamps/berkley.cfm
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