FL Federation State Team Tourn. 6/24-25/06

We had a 4 man team from our club (Cocoa Bassmasters) went to the state team tournament in Palatka, FL on the St. Johns River. We did pretty good and took third place with 45.81 lbs. against locals which included Preston Clark, his dad and two other team mates. Preston's team won the event with 56 lbs. the second place team would have won by two ounces but they had two dead fish penalties which was a deduction of 10 ounces so they were 8 ounces behind. I was lucky enough to draw L.E. Clark (Preston's dad) on Saturday, what a super nice guy! We had a good time but he only caught 3 and I caught 2, no big ones. L.E. was waiting for the tide to roll but the wind held it back and they never turned on. The second day I caught 3 and my partner that day caught 2, one of which was a 4 1/2 pounder. One of the guys on my team won lunker on Saturday with a 7 1/2 pounder. Our main goal was to qualify for the State Championship, the top six teams got qualified. We had many missed fish, short strikes, and lost fish that would have put us there, but that's why they call it fishing not catching. I had two good fish on the toad Sunday in Lily pads that got off as well. I caught fish on Senko's, U-tail worms, toads, and one fish on a crank bait. The Senko cut tails that I gave to my team mate did the trick for him. Natural colors worked the best i.e. - smoke gold flake cut tail, baby bass Kinami worms, candy bug U-tail, green pumkin pearl toads, green pumpkin swirl cane toad, green pumpkin toads, and a fire tiger crank bait med. diver.